vatheon | ♌ Leo gets techy with it

Entry tags:

♌ Leo gets techy with it - [OPEN]

who: Leo and Anyone
what: Programming the app mentioned here, but open to hanging out/chatting as well.
when: Every afternoon during curse week starting 5/21.
where: in the park underneath a shady tree
style: Starting with prose, but will change to match.
status: OPEN

Leo made his way into the park and picked out a large shady tree with a bench to sit under. If he was going to be spending all afternoon in one place it had to be somewhere comfortable and easy to be spotted in.

Buford was with him and he was using the sentient table to rest his SFC on so he could check for any messages while he waited for people to come get the app programmed in. He had no clue how many takers - if any - there would be, but he hoped that at least a few would be interested. He could really use the money to get some things from the Nostalgia Nook, especially some celestial bronze. He had a few projects lined up and couldn't get anywhere on them without some decent funding.

While he waited, he kept himself busy by fiddling around with some materials he'd gathered from the shopping district and from his magic tool belt. He built tiny machines and then took them apart again to make something new.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"Long version, please." Equius is pretty mechanically minded himself, and he's sure he'll be able to keep up.

Leo grinned, getting to talk with someone who could understand it was always a bonus.

"So," he picked up one of the screwdrivers and began pointing at the different automaton parts as he explained. "It uses a clockwork frame for the limbs and moving them. And there's this little wind-up key here on the back. A few winds of this and it can go for about an hour. These gears here and here control the movement of the limbs which is dictated by the teeth you see here. Kind of like a music box, except instead of making music it dances. Unfortunately, without celestial bronze, the parts are just too big to allow it to both dance and make music. And let's be real, dancing tools are so much cooler than musical ones."

Equius listens closely, nodding in understanding and examining the tools more closely. He makes no move to pick them up, however.

"So you're using clockworks..." He nods again. "Makes sense. Have you considered alternate power sources? Clockworks are always going to be limited in their scope. And tell me what celestial bronze is." Yes, he picked up on that, and wants to know more about this building material.

"Yeah, Buford runs on steam." He points at the table, which is puffing out little bursts of steam despite not appearing to have anywhere to hide that sort of mechanism. "And the warship I built runs on a volatile mixture of Lemnos fire, Greek fire and water from the River Styx. But I had this giant flying celestial bronze dragon. His name is Festus. He lost his body, but now he's the masthead for my ship. He was an automaton and used clockwork mechanisms for the most part. He can breathe fire and when he was whole, he could compact himself into a rolling suitcase."

"But don't knock the clockwork, dude. When I get my hands on some celestial bronze I'll show you just how amazing it can be. It's a metal mined from Mount Olympus. Kind of rare and pretty damn magical. It's what allows Festus to change shape and size. Percy's sword is made from the stuff and it turns into a pen when it's not in use. Just a standard sized pen, but it houses a 3 foot long broadsword."

"Buford." Equius sounds a little bemused by all this. "Your table is named Buford."

Named tables aside, the talk of giant weapons catches his interest, and he sits back on his heels to get a better look at Leo. "So you're skilled then with both micro and macro designs? Tell me more about your warship and your dragon. Are either of them here?"

He doubts it, but a troll can hope!

"Buford's a good name. You're not making fun of it are you? You might get him steamed." Leo laughed.

"Unfortunately neither of them are here. I didn't build Festus, but I did fix him when he went haywire. No one else had been able to approach him because of the fire-breathing, but being fire-proof, that really didn't phase me. Managed to fix him up and find him some wings in one night. He wasn't perfectly fixed up, but I didn't have much time for that. One of these days I'd like to rebuild him, but I don't know if I'll get that chance."

"The ship was something I drew when I was 5 years old. Complete with Festus's head as the masthead. Someone who'd been at the camp a long time ago had made blueprints for that ship, so we worked off of those. I didn't have much time for anything but eating and sleeping during the 6 months we spent building it. The engine for that runs on that fire and water mixture I was telling you about. It's a 200 ft long Greek trireme with two levels below deck. It can fly, land on dry ground as well as travel by sea. Some of the parts are clockwork, some aren't. The controls for the ship are pretty sweet. Got a Wii remote, a dubstep soundboard, leer jet controls, and a keyboard monitor. But I'm the only one who knows how to use all of them."

He paused to let all of that sink in. "Dude, feel free to stop me any time. I could talk your ears off about all of this."

Not only is Equius still listening intently, he's even gotten a pen and pad of paper out of his sylladex so he can take notes. He doesn't know what a Wii remote or a Leer jet is, but he has been introduced to dubstep.

"Do you do any kind of biomechanical work?"

"Nah, I'd rather stick to straight up machines. But it's cool if that's your thing." Leo gives him a thumbs up. "Is that your thing?"

"That is my thing." Now it's time for Equius to word vomit at Leo. "I started by making killbots, which are strictly mechanical, but then branched out. My neighbor lost her arm and eye in an accident, and while I couldn't make eyes back then, I made her an arm. There was another troll in my group who was paralyzed from the waist down, and I made him functional legs. The attachment process was a bit of a daymare--Karkat fainted--but now he can walk and do almost everything he could before. Those first legs were pretty sad attempts, and he's gone through about three upgrades since being in Vatheon. His name is Tavros, you might meet him later."

"Then I perfected my skills further in Vatheon, and I made Sollux a pair of robotic eyes when he arrived here blind. My greatest achievement was RoboEquius, though. Would you like to meet him?"

"Sounds like things were rough where you came from if that many of your friends needed new body parts," Leo said. "I can see why it became your thing." Sure, the number wasn't high - only three of them - but three in a group that was probably smaller than a cabin or two's worth of kids at camp was a lot.

"RoboEquius? Sure man, I'm always down for meeting a machine." He grinned.

Equius actually forgot to mention Aradia's soulbot body, so yeah, out of twelve trolls, three of them had (canon) upgrades.

"One moment." He lifts one hand and touches his head, just behind his left ear. A look of concentration passes over his face before he drops his hand. "All right, I called him. He'll be here in a few minutes."

"Do you have a communicator tucked behind your ear or was that telepathy or something? Either way, very cool." Leo had ways to communicate with Buford, but none of them were as cool and stealth as that.

"What?" Equius looks genuinely confused by the question. "What are you talking about? All I did was call him."

[OOC: It's Vathcanon that Equius can't explain how he communicates with RoboEquius.]

"You just touched behind your ear and went silent. I don't know how that's calling, but okay." Leo looked around, waiting for any sign of a robot to appear. He kind of wanted to climb up on Equius's back and inspect his ear, but he managed to resist that urge.

[ooc: Works for me. Pretty much all of Leo's techy explanations are pure bullshit headcanon on my behalf since Rick just completely hand waves how 95% of it works in canon.]

Had Leo tried that, Equius would have frozen in shock and let him climb all over him. It's hard, being a STRONG troll that can't reliably control his STRENGTH. It's hard, and no one understands.

Because Equius can never explain how he communicates with his robot--he just does, trying to explain it is like trying to explain how to make your heart beat--he lapses into silence. Fortunately, RoboEquius wasn't far away, and comes walking around the corner a few minutes later.

"There he is." RoboEquius is a near-perfect replica of his creator, down to the broken horn and black tank top. The robot strolls over and regards Leo with glowing red eyes. "This is RoboEquius. RoboEquius, this is... I'm sorry, what's your name? I'm Equius Zahhak."

As the robot approached, Leo had a hard time believing his eyes. I was like seeing double. He rubbed his eyes and then pinched his arm, making sure he really was seeing this.

"Yeah, I kind of figured that was your name when RoboEquius showed up looking just like you." Leo laughed. "I'm Leo Valdez, nice to meet you, dude. That is one sweet robot." He held out his fist for a fist bump.

"A pleasure to meet you. And thank you." Equius holds out his own fist, but stops it a few inches from Leo's, letting it hang in the air and waiting for the human to bump them together. RoboEquius looks on imperially. "You can touch him, if you like. Just be careful; anything you do to him, I feel."

Leo met his fist, but was a little confused about why he'd held back. "Dude, I hope you didn't hold back because I'm so shrimpy. I'm stronger than I look."

"That's kind of creepy." He looked back and forth between Equius and Robo Equius. He wasn't sure whether or not to believe the guy about it, so he stepped forward and grabbed the robot's forearm gently and lifted it up to eye level. If it was true that he could feel everything, he wasn't sure he was comfortable touching anywhere else.

Not that he really needed to anyway. Just touching the machine allowed him to tell so much about it. It was kind of like when he had touched the helicopter and was able to fly it. But since he'd pulled the arm up so close to his face, he might as well examine the skin.

"It had nothing to do with you. I'm STRONGER than I look." And he can't control it well either, which is why he held back. It's not polite to break someone's hand the first time you meet them.

"It was a deliberate feature I built in." RoboEquius was intended as a hate romance bot, but Equius sees no real need to explain that. His arm tingles a little when Leo touches the robot, but that's all. When he can't see the bot being touched, the sensation is lessened.

RoboEquius watches Leo passively, allowing the human to manipulate his arm. He can tell he's being appreciated, so he's being more cooperative than usual.

"Deliberate? I'm not sure I want to know why," Leo said as he slowly released the arm. "Wicked work on this though, dude. I can't believe how realistic he is."

"Thank you. He's my finest piece of work." RoboEquius looks at Leo for a moment, then puts his hand up and spreads his fingers so Leo can see the interlocking pieces of metal between them. Alpha Equius smirks a little. "He's showing off for you."

"You should be proud. He's amazing." Leo said while checking out the space between RoboEquius's fingers. "You can't even tell he's a machine from a distance. Even up close it's hard to tell."

RoboEquius positively gloats at that little bit of praise, which Alpha Equius chooses to ignore. Lousy uppity robot. "If you like, we could compare notes sometime. I'm interested in the materials and energy sources you mentioned."

"That would be awesome, bro. You can stop by any time or whatever. I live with my friends at Coral Corral Eight." Leo gave him a thumbs up.

"All right. Likewise, you can come visit my workshop. I'm at fifteen, Phanga neighborhood." A hint of a smile dances across Equius' face at the thumbs up, although he doesn't return it. "Fair warning, though... I live with my matesprit, ancestor, and several animals. If you don't like chocobos or hoofbeasts, it would probably be better for me to come visit you."

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can I friend you on Plurk? I'm enjoying this CR a lot and may need to plot and scheme in the future

yes, feel free! I am up for anyone that I've threaded with adding me. \o/

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perfect icon is perfect

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