“So to crify.” Temate started as he sat on the couch in one of the dens Honey had given the group. Surrender and Pipuck had left to get something to eat. That was only after Temate, who had noticed Toni’s irritation with their reiterated advice, suggested it. He directed them to the eating area where Honey, Milis and he had their te lunch the day before.

  “You can’t get into the... Empowering state like everyone else has?” Temate asked. It was a simple statement, boiled down from all her compining and argumentation with Pipuck and Surrender. She seemed on edge, Temate noted. She was also sweating, and Temate had a thought as to why.

  “Yes, nobody’s advice helps! It’s just irritating and the more I think about it the more I get frustrated. I want to help, to be able to fight with you but at this rate…” Toni cut herself off with an exasperated sigh as she paced back and forth.

  “Mmm. Have you ever tried meditation back home?” Temate asked after a brief pause.

  “Yeah, a few times, I sucked at that too, couldn’t clear my mind and focus. It’s just… HOW do you do that, ya know?” She practically growled as she threw herself down, limbs sprawled out, onto another couch.

  “Hmmm, do you know what getting in the zone is?” Temate asked another question, noticing how Toni’s eyes furrowed and she frowned.

  “Yeah, what’s this got to do with anything?”

  “Have you ever been in the zone?”

  Toni frowned deeper as Temate watched her brain spin. She seemed distracted, aware that Temate was getting at something, but unable to grasp what.

  “I don’t think so, the closest I can think about is when I would get focused on some engineering problem back home, that was my major by the way, and lose hours to it." She allowed her head to roll backwards over the arm rest to look at Temate. "Why?"

  A pn was already forming in Temate's head. He had only experienced the Empowering once, twice if you counted his unconscious delve, but he had a good grasp on it. It was a familiar state to him, a state of deep focus and immersion in something. A state he often found himself in when pying important NPC's during his regur Pathfinder sessions.

  “Could you grab your gun?” He pointed over towards her bag, where she’d stowed the gun.

  “Uh, I guess but I’m out of ammo so…” Toni said as she walked over and dug the gun out from where she’d buried it. Hidden deep inside the bag, just in case. She came back over and sat next to him, pointing the gun at him. He smiled at her and grinned a little.

  “Isn’t that like, a no no with guns?” Toni blinked, then seemed to notice what she was doing.

  “It is, but there’s nothing to shoot, safety is on, and my hands off the trigger.” Toni replied, blushing slightly as she shifted her grip and pointed it away from him anyway.

  Temate ughed, then asked. “How fast can you take that apart and put it back together?”

  “Mmmm, I can do a full field strip in maybe 12 seconds I don't stumble? Why?” Her confusion deepened slightly, but curiosity began to come into her expression.

  “Bet you can’t do it 5 times in a minute.” He challenged her, she blinked at him, pausing for a brief moment. Then she fred up just as Temate had hoped she would. After all, she had been clearly irritable and that worked in his favor.

  “Bet I can!” Toni snapped back.

  “Do it then.” Temate said with a calm, dismissive tone. He leaned back with his arms hanging over the back of the couch and watched.

  She did. She tried to at least. Temate grabbed his phone to time her, only to see it dead and grimaced. He hadn’t charged it. So Temate kept track of time in his head, something he was incredibly good at in a way that spooked people sometimes. He used to py a lot of those silly little games, the ones where you have to stop the timer at specific times. He could get it within half a second every 2 out of 3 times pretty easily.

  He counted down as he watched her work. Toni moved with the awkward motions of a tired, frustrated person as she took the gun apart and then put it back together. Then again. And aga-

  "Time. Told you, can't do it." Temate grinned as Toni looked up at him incredulously.

  “What! Bull shit, I can do it!”

  “Uh huuuh.” Temate said, putting on a false attitude of mockery that incensed the young girl. Truth be told, he did believe she could, but he needed her to want to do this herself, to prove it. To obsess on it. After years of being a good dungeon master, he knew when to py the vilin a bit, and he could do it well.

  “I CAN! Count me off again.” She snapped, flipping her red hair which seemed to burn in the light of the sun pit. So he counted her down again, she made it through her fourth field strip before he called time.

  “Better that time, again?” He asked Toni, lifting one eyebrow as if to say 'it's okay, you can give up'.

  “Again!” And so she tried again. And again. And again. Eventually she stopped asking him to count her off and just kept field stripping her gun over and over again. Temate wondered absentmindedly if that was good for the gun. He leaned back and watched her, eventually he saw something change and stopped bothering to count her off.

  Toni’s vision was focused, sered in on the gun as she moved with mechanical efficiency. Again and again and again. To Temate’s great pleasure she did reach the goal of five attempts in a minute, then per minute, as she kept going. Temate smiled slightly and wondered what was going on in her head.

  She could do it. She could. She refused to stop, she just assumed Temate would track it and kept going, waiting for him to tell her. Focusing wholly on her gun.

  Magazine out.

  Slide back.

  Takedown lever down.

  Slide off.

  Recoil assembly out.

  Barrel cleared.

  All down, disassembly complete.

  Now reassemble.

  Barrel up.

  Recoil assembly in.

  Slide on.

  Takedown lever up.

  Slide set.

  Function check.

  Magazine in.

  Repeat.

  Again and again she repeated the task. She became vaguely aware of a strange fluidity that took over. At some point she wasn’t thinking about the independent actions, but feeling the rhythm of the whole. Heard the clicking of the mechanisms and assemblies. She felt a click in her head and she was no longer looking at her precious 365 her father gifted her.

  She was looking at an incomplete machine. A roaring engine, fire and steam spewing from many vents, sat at the heart of it. There were so many parts, so many pieces, that needed connecting, she saw it. Some part of her realized what had happened but she wasn’t really thinking, just moving. Doing what felt right.

  She knew in a moment what the glowing, thundering engine was, knew that the Power needed to be directed. She turned every internal mechanism she could on. The core of the machine came first. She felt it in her heart as the Power connected. The engine roared to life and she felt herself grow more alive with it. Knowledge, ideas, [Powers] filled her. No, they were always in her, she just turned on the lights. Became aware of them, connected with part of her she didn't even know was there until now.

  [Fshforge]

  [Eternal Fme]

  [Hunter’s Instinct]

  [Hammer Down]

  [Rapid Repair]

  These were her, and they were hers. Her [Powers] and she felt like a piece of her that had been broken was fixed. Made new.

  Then she was back, her hands stopped moving as she clicked the st piece of her gun into pce and she blinked. She was still warm, the light of the sun pit ensured that, but she wasn’t on fire as she had been. She looked around the room, not fully present as her mind processed... everything.

  Behind her, on the couch Temate had passed out his head lolled over the back of the couch. She saw no sign of Pipuck or Surrender, heard no sign, just silence and a soft snore. It took her a long moment as something bubbled in her chest but finally, she processed fully what had just happened. She'd done it.

  She'd done it! She leapt to her feet.

  “AAAAAAAAH I DID IT! HAHAHAHA I DID IT!” She turned and leaped onto Temate who grunted awake as she ughed and hugged him.

  He ughed too. “Uh, yeah, yeah you did it awhile ago.” It took her a second to realize he was talking about beating his challenge and she ughed harder, giddy with excitement. Head spinning as she looked into his eyes.

  “Not that dumb dumb, I mean of course I did that, but I Empowered! I DID IT!” Then, she kissed him. It wasn’t a passionate kiss, but it wasn’t exactly chaste either. She pulled away abruptly pale as she looked down and saw where she was, and realized what she had just done.

  She was straddling his p, her arms wrapped around his neck. Her face grew extremely hot again, and she knew it wasn’t the sun pit, or whatever was happening before she Empowered. She leapt up and off of him, hands behind her back as she began ughing uncertainly and slowly pulling away.

  “I uh, sorry I didn’t, I mean that wasn’t, I shouldn’t have… I’m gonna…” She thumbed over her shoulder towards the bedroom.

  “I mean that’s awfully quick.” Temate said before she’d even taken a step. She blushed even brighter red.

  “That’s not what I meant, I’m going to go in there and bury my face in the pillows in embarrassment, and you’re not following me.” She managed to half squeak that out. She was halfway around the couch when he spoke.

  “Toni, sit. Let’s talk.” He said it kindly, but Toni felt a bit of authority in the statement. She paused, briefly considering running, but then looked into his face. She sat down on the couch she had in across earlier. She waited, once again she didn’t really know what to say, and she could see Temate watching her.

  He looked to be figuring out how to say what he wanted to say. So instead of simply waiting around awkwardly, she did something practical. She picked her gun up off the floor and ejected the magazine.

  She took the magazine as Temate watched her, and activated a [Power]. Well technically it was two [Powers], [Fshforge] and [Eternal Fme]. [Fshforge] allowed her to create a small, hand sized, metal object. The object only sted a couple minutes, but she could make multiple in short succession.

  [Eternal Fme] did exactly what it said on the tin. It allowed her to create a fme that required no fuel and which she could expand or contract at will. The amount of fme she could sustain was limited, but the combination was perfect. At least she hoped it would be, she just had to test her idea.

  With a fsh and a soft hiss she created a small metal cartridge, a bullet in yman's terms, which perfectly fit in her magazine. She could feel the small fme sitting where the primer was normally located, like a little warm spot in her heart. It looked good, looked like a quality piece of ammunition.

  She grinned, filling her mag up with her little fsh forged bullets, and loaded it into her gun. She aimed it at the cushion of the couch across from her, and tested her idea. She focused on the fme of the bullet in the chamber and willed it to grow. It did. It grew quickly, a roaring inferno that quickly became a whine as it reached its limits.

  She could feel the fme straining to grow further as she willed it to do so, but it couldn't. When she felt it was dense enough she pulled the trigger, and her gun roared. The bullet flew and the back cushion of the far couch burst as the bullet embedded itself into her fluffy foe. She grinned.

  “Ok, that’s pretty cool.” Temate said and Toni jumped, remembering where she was.

  “Sorry, talk.” She had rexed, she could talk, the first question. “Talk about what?”

  Temate smiled softly at her and she felt her heart skip a beat. She smiled back without thinking.

  “The very obvious crush you have on me.” He said, and Toni felt her heart start pounding in her chest.

  “W-whaaaaat, pfff what crush. You might be thinking too deeply into that kiss, I was just excited and-”

  “Toni.” Temate cut her off, raising one eyebrow. She winced and smiled sheepishly at him.

  “Obvious, huh?” She asked.

  “Yes, and it may help if I tell you that I find you very attractive and incredibly sweet.” Toni blinked and sat up, no longer hunched over. When had she done that?

  “Really?” She smacked herself mentally at how high pitched her voice was. Temate nodded to her and she couldn’t stop the smile that broke out on her face. “Then is there, would you like to uh… I don’t know how it would work, but we could maybe explore that? See if it’s more?”

  Her heart was roaring, funny, she could hear it super clearly now. That was another thing he’d done, he’d helped her find a way into her heart. Her way into her heart. She knew how to do it now, she was confident she could do that again herself. But it was Temate who helped her find her way there in the first pce, with just a few questions and a challenge. Temate’s mouth opened and his next words made her heart drop out of her chest a bit.

  “It might not be a good idea.” He said it so matter-of-fact, as always it wasn't unkind, just very... Blunt. She sunk a little, even felt a few tears coming to her eyes which surprised her. She hadn't realized how much... how quickly she had... but that was always how it was. Before she could excuse herself in embarrassment and sadness, he spoke again.

  “That’s not a no, to be clear. It’s just I’m not a… normal partner.” He looked at her, staring into her eyes. She could see him trying to find words, parse how to say what he needed to say. She just ughed a little.

  “I’m not exactly a normal partner either.” She was always awkward about giving or receiving flirting for exactly that reason. She’d had few partners, and most had not sted long because of her… interests. Sure initially they’d liked some of her softer weirdness's, but eventually they found her deeper wants. That made them leave, every single one of them. Well except him, but he... No, he was gone, it didn't matter now.

  “Hmmm alright, how bout a game.” Temate offered, she blinked.

  “Uh, what? Why?” She replied, once again Temate had both confused her and piqued her curiosity at the same time.

  “It’s a little ice breaker I usually use on first dates. Not that I’ve had one in a while, but it helps. We can use it to dig into our mutual weirdness in a somewhat safe way.” He answered her.

  She thought about it for a little bit before she responded. “Ooooh, that sounds fun, sure lets do it!”