(no subject)

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

[Out of Milliways: "Blessed are You, Lord, God of All Creation, Master of Engineers..."]

The door opens on a dimly lit room. There's a light burning somewhere nearby, but the armored figure that clanks through doesn't need it just at the- oh, it's Ellen, she's got her helmet off. Well, all right.

"Bar?" she says as she approaches said fixture, Dogmeat at her heels. "I'm going to go upstairs and change into my old Vault suit, but when I come down, could you please have some things ready for me? I'm going to need four good-quality ceramic magnets, about two hundred feet of thirty gauge copper wire, a miniature incandescent bulb, some cardboard, a three-inch nail, some sandpaper, something sticky, and a handle for cranking. Oh, and I guess I should probably eat, too."

It takes her fifteen or twenty minutes to get all the armor off, so it may be a while before she gets back and reclaims her stuff from Bar. Feel free to encounter her before or after she gets into the blue and gold jumpsuit.

Comments

[makesthings]

Sam's yawning as he enters and look at the pile of things, "What are you making, Ellen?"

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

"Oh- hi, Sameth," says Ellen, looking up. "Just a little demonstration generator. I met a young man here from a world where they have electric power but get it by very different means, and I wanted to show him how the principle works at home. How are you?"

[makesthings]

"Good and busy. Can I help? What means do they work by in his world?"

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

"Well, this is just one of the little versions we used to make as science projects," Ellen says. "I'll show you, but I have to be able to make one of these by myself from memory, too. On his world they've got people called benders, who can control things like rock and soil and water and air, and apparently the ones who can control fire can create fire pretty much at will as long as there's oxygen. He says they also create lightning, so the generator plants are basically places where they employ firebenders to make lightning for public use."

[makesthings]

"Oh, interesting, I don't think I've met one of them."

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

Ellen nods. "He's an earthbender- he does it professionally, as a sports player," she says. "And he said he'd take me to one of his matches sometime when he could, so I offered to show him how we make electricity using magnets and wire in exchange."

[makesthings]

"I'll have to look for him as I'd love to learn more ways of making things."

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

"He's about this tall," Ellen says, indicating someone rather bigger than her. "Broad shoulders. Black hair, green eyes, and a big smile. I think he's a little younger than me, but I couldn't really tell."

[makesthings]

"He doesn't sound too hard to miss. Are you going to make the generator in front of him?"

Sam wants to make certain he understands the plan.

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

"Once I've put one or two together and made sure I can do it right, yeah," says Ellen. "I might also try making one that has a pinwheel on the end instead of a hand crank so he can see how we use wind turbines to generate power back home."

[makesthings]

"Like a small scale windmill?"

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

"Something like that, yeah," Ellen says. "I mean, if you can blow on it hard enough, it should work as well as cranking a lot by hand, right?"

[makesthings]

"It might take more than that but yes, it should be possible."

[brave_kreyu]

Kreyu peers curiously at the pile of....things that Ellen is making something out of. No, she has no idea what Ellen's trying to make.

"Hello, Ellen," she says with a smile. "Might I inquire as to what you are making?"

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

"Oh- hi, Kreyu," says Ellen, looking up. "I'm making a very small example of an electrical generator to show someone I met here... how familiar are you with that kind of thing?"

[brave_kreyu]

"I have heard them mentioned here, but I have never seen one," Kreyu replies. "My own world has only just learned to forge iron, so they are not something I have around at home."

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

"Okay," says Ellen. "Well- basically, the lights you see here in the Bar? Overhead, like that one?" She points to a hanging lamp. "They run on electricity, like a lot of other devices. Electricity's the energy of lightning, is probably the simplest way to put it, and it's very close to the energy of magnets- lodestones, I guess, I think I remember that being an old word for them. You can create an electrical current by turning something that can carry electricity, like copper wire, through the currents of energy that come from a magnet."

[brave_kreyu]

"Ah, I think I see," Kreyu replies. "I find it fascinating that so many worlds learned to harness lightning without the use of any magic."

"You have been well?"

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

Ellen smiles a little. "People can be very stubborn when it comes to figuring out how to get what they want," she says. "Even without magic."

"I've been all right. I don't remember- were you here about a month ago? When I had my twentieth birthday? I got promoted to Paladin and they made me an official Brotherhood of Steel chaplain. I've got a tech reclamation project now and people who're technically under my command."

[brave_kreyu]

"I was not, I'm afraid," Kreyu explains. She looks quite pleased at news of Ellen's promotion, though.

"Congratulations, Ellen! It is good to see that your brothers and sisters acknowledge your skill. What can you tell me about your project?"

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

"Well," says Ellen, "it's- hm. Okay. First things first. Do you know what a robot is?"

[brave_kreyu]

"They are something like a golem, are they not? A construct that can act on its own and perform tasks?"

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

"That's about right," Ellen says, "not that I know what a golem is- but yes, a metal device that can act on its own... If you know Alyx Vance, she tends to have one follow her around. There's lots of different kinds. The project I've been given is to get a factory where robots used to be made to work again. It's been defunct for two hundred years, but the central computer was still working when I found it, so it has all the plans for the place and how to make robots in its storage. We just have to repair everything and get it materials and power."

[brave_kreyu]

Kreyu nods, her mind going through the possible uses of such a force. "A worthy goal, making more strong hands to rebuild a world that has been so badly damaged."

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

"That's not all," Ellen says. "I mean, that's important, yeah. The robots can work in places where humans would get sick and die, and they don't need to eat or sleep, just have their batteries replaced when they're drained. So they're able to do a lot of things humans can't, work-wise, which is why I proposed we try to get the factory back online in the first place... There's a place in my world that used to be an industrial city called Pittsburgh. These days it's called the Pitt, and it's kind of earned that name. I've- I've been there."

It's going to be a bit before she figures out exactly how to phrase the next part.