We Didn't Start the Fire

[Nina]

Temple stared at the hole in space and at Davian's urging followed him across into the brightly lit room beyond. She hadn't known what to expect, going through the hole, and it wasn't at all like her stepping, which is what she called her own teleporting, in fact. it wasn't like anything at all, just like stepping through a door.

On the other side was the guy named Ryan who made the hole and the lady that had been in the dining room and the guy she had ridden for a while Danny. The girl started talking as soon as she laid eyes on Temple.

1 hour ago, Cassandra Durrant said:

"Hey. Sorry about scaring you earlier," she apologized, "I just have loud powers to go with my loud personality. No one bothered you after your impressive disappearing act, I hope. At least that you didn't mind bothering you. Oh. Right. Never got your name. You can call me Cassie."

 

Temple halted as soon as she realized the woman was talking to her. She stared unblinking and then looked at Davian, who just nodded indicating she should answer. She wiped her nose with her dirty sleeve and chewed her lip. "Uh yeah hi, Temple, I'm Temple," she said her voice barely a whisper. She coughed to clear her throat, looked at Davian, "Can i have some water?"

[Malachite]

"Water or anything else here," he said gently, indicating the large amount of food that had been laid out for Cassie. "Danny, I'm sure we're keeping you from your actual work. Thank you for bringing this up. I'll text the cafeteria staff to send up more refreshments if we need them; no need to play runner for us anymore." His tone was gentle but firm as he redirected the media manager from being so wow'd by Cassie's mere presence that he was playing entry-level gopher for them all back to his actual duties. 

 

To Cassie he asked, "Are you okay with Temple and I sitting in on your interview? It would give her a chance to see the process."  

[Exile_Jeane]

"Not at all," Cassandra answered agreeably. One more interviewer wasn't that much more nerve-wracking, and if it helped Temple get over whatever demons were haunting her or had her dressed like a bedraggled escapee from an insane asylum, it was her pleasure. She decided on one particular bagel, pulling it in half in one smooth motion. 

 

She turned to face the senior Stormer, squaring her shoulders, "Ready when you are, Sir."

 

Cassandra took a bite  of her trophy, clearly savoring it as she chewed, waiting for the answer and all outward self-assurance. She wasn't expecting today to be half as exciting as it was today, and all she was short was Novastorm's genius creator found to fly in on a jetpack or something to complete her set. Crazy times. Wouldn't trade it for anything.

[Nina]

Temple had gone over to where the food and drink had been pointed out by Davian. She felt like everyone was watching, but she also knew that that was her own insecurities speaking. She reached for a bagel and pulled her hand back as Cassie who was at the table as well reached for the same one. 

 

That was when Davian asked the beautiful girl next to her if she minded if Temple sat in on the interview.

 

Temple looked back over her shoulder Davian. < Do you want me to scan her during the interview? > She thought at her new boss hoping his weird blocks would let her mind speak through.

[Malachite]

Davian gave Temple a glance and she heard his quiet, smooth voice respond to her without a sound. <My lawyers will have a collective heart attack if I actually agree to that in any official capacity. We'll need to draft up a standard disclaimer about telepathic verification of intent and interview answers before Novastorm can officially employ your skills somewhere like an interview. It's not illegal yet - though there's several dozen bills and riders making their way through Congress right now. . .> He didn't shake his head, but she could feel the mental equivalent. He did give her an encouraging smile. <Mostly, I really did want you see what an interview here is like. You'll need to go through your own at some point. Until then, you're my guest here and in my home.>

 

 

[Nina]

Temple poured a cup of ice water and looked up at Cassie and smiled at her then returned to stand by Davian.

 

< Okay > She flashed a thought back at him with a pleasant smiley face emote attached. 

[Shameless]

Ryan chuckled.  "We'd actually conducted a fair amount of it already, and I want you to understand this isn't exactly normal.  Our Head of HR normally conducts interviews, but as she was out today, I find myself elected to handle this."

He smiled, and then continued.  "i've already asked what Cassandra's aspirations are, as well as what abilities she has thus far demonstrated.  It would be improper to reveal how she answered without her consent in this matter."   Ryan paused to look over to her, and she nodded.  "I don't mind you telling her."  

 

With a nod, Ryan resumed speaking.   "She's explained how she wants to use her abilities which seem to be some form of destructive energy discharge, as well as her more obvious physical presence without hurting others.   While we don't yet have facilities on site to measure and test such abilities, I was going to suggest that after we eat, we do have some undeveloped, secluded property where we can have a demonstration.   I'd asked Deezy to join us, and I'm sure she'll have some way to quantify Cassandra's destructive ability at the very least."

"As Cassandra is a legal adult we don't have to worry about consent, which I admit is a concern for you Temple."  he let out a sigh.  "Though since it was Davian who brought you here, I'm not as worried as I normally would be."

[Nina]

"Their all dead." she said without an emotion. "My folks, my sister and brother everybody in my town they were burned by the thing in the fire. Didn't get me though." The young girl took a sip of ice water. "So, I don't need no ones consent to do nuthin'" 

 

She set the cup down on the table and looked at the two men,, not really sure which of them was the real boss. "If that's gonna be a problem, I'll just go on right now." She said as she hefted her bag over her shoulder giving them time to speak.

 

As she did this she felt an emotional nudge of concern and puzzlement. She knew that Davian wanted to ask her something but not out loud, < Did want to say something don't want them to hear? >

 

< Concern for your privacy > Davin's mind voice came back to her strong and confident, he was good at this, she thought, his mind speak was already natural in her head. < Are you legally over 18? If you aren't we can set up a temporary guardianship until you are, then you would be legally covered.> 

<No I ain't eighteen. If you think that's a good Idea we can do that.>

Their conversation was at  the speed of thought and took only a second

[Malachite]

<How old are you, Temple?> Davian asked directly but gently through the link. <If you're underage, I can set up a guardianship until you're legally an adult. It would protect you from being put in foster care or having to live on the run.>

 

< I'm seventeen. If you think that's a good idea I suppose that would be okay.>

<Well, at least it'll only for a few months, then.> 

 

She chuckled in her mind < I just turned seventeen so most of a year but yeah. I think i'd like that.>

 

Aloud, Davian said, "I think we can work that out with our legal team, Ryan. Lots of people are in the same situation and she'll be better off with a job and a home here with us than out on the streets. Or bopping between hotels."

 

The last was said with a charming smirk for how literal that would probably be. 

[SalmonMax]

And just then...something hit the door. There was a clunking noise, then a muffled, "oof."

 

Then some tapping along the door surface. The doorknob wiggled. Then turned.

 

Behind it was Deezy, with an immense visor of some kind covering the upper half of her face, connected by cables that ran down her arms to a heavy pair of gloves that went halfway up her forearms and had a variety of buttons and lights on them. Beyond that she had a labcoat on over a striped T shirt and a pair of jeans, with sneakers half-untied. She stood there a second, peering myopically around through the fully opaque visor. Then she held up a gauntleted hand and waved.

 

"Hey there neeeeeeeeeew blood! Welcome to the...conference room, I think? For your interview...to be part of this grand...and noble adventure."

 

She frowned slightly and tapped a finger in the air, then made a winding motion.

 

"That sounded so much better in my head. Okay, nevermind that. You guys can call me Deezy, and I'm one of the founding members of Novastorm, and head of the Procurement and R&D divisions, plus I have my own thing going as part of the greater corporate constellation called Klattatech, which you'll be hearing more about...later. Probably."

 

"ANYWAY!"

 

"Just wanted to head on up, get a little sunlight, snag something out of the fridge and say hi. And also...this augmented reality thing needed a test. Ryan, that door...does not have the RFID tags in it. So..."

 

She aimed a gauntlet at the door. It made a little 'chuff' noise, and something thocked into it. Deezy gasped and clapped her hands, making a rattle of plastic on plastic. "So cool."

 

"Okay! Questions? Requests? Pleas for mercy?"

[Shameless]

"We were going to head out in abit, and see just how destructive Cassandra's abilities are, I was wondering if you'd like to come along, as i know you can easily make some way to quantify it, and you always seem to like a good fireworks show."

The elder Stormer chuckled softly.  "A Guardianship would work well for Temple, if that's what you want."

[Exile_Jeane]

Money had been fairly tight in the Durrant household and college loans sucked, but Cassandra had never had to live on the streets. The thought of losing any of her family members, let alone all of them, struck a deep chord of dread in Cassandra transmuting into a deep sense of empathy for the younger girl. And Temple was just the tip of the iceberg in this region, one of the luck few to be given something in return for her One Bad Day. The way she flinched away from competing with her for the bagel in her hand..? Her thoughts gnarled and a frown crossed her lips, a perverse sense of ironic helplessness tainting her blooming understanding that she was essentially good as hired, her own quest made suddenly petty.

 

And then Deezy staggered into the room in a rig that Cassandra wanted to take apart and put together *right now*, exploding all the bad mojo in the room in one gloriously awkward introduction.

 

Oh. Wow. They had talked about 'Stormer Super Science' between classes back at Cuesta and here she was not ten feet from one of the titans of the field. Not even the gloomy reminder Temple needed a Guardian for the next however many months until her 18th birthday could repress the grin that reconquered it's lost ground in a flash. "Yeah. Hi. Pleasure to meet you, Miss Kla… Deezy. I'd be honored if you came to help. Also, I left my hearing and eye pro back at the hotel, so if someone could loan me a set of that... Hell yeah, I'll do my four-days-of-being-a-Stormer best," she chuckled, pausing as she realized the hand she was waving in greeting held half a bagel.

 

Screw it. The brunette bombshell took a bite and chewed, savoring the taste as she awaited a reaction.  

[Nina]

Temple couldn't help it she had gotten used to at the very least skimming the minds that she came in contact. Normal people would, in most cases, never know or suspect, but when it came to the empowered, Temple really didn't know if they could pick it up or not, so she usually didn't try, but if she didn't know, she would do it cautiously.

 

With Deezy there was no doubt that she was empowered but the way the woman talked, well, Temple just couldn't resist at least trying for a peek.

Wow!

Deezy didn't have the fuzzy defensive barrier like Davian, and Temple didn't even think that the hyper intelligent girl was even defending against psychic intrusion, but the mind Temple glimpsed in her crazy red head was full on chaos. I was like Deezy was thinking about ten different things all at once and new ideas and thoughts popped up as other were shuffled off. It was difficult to get even a real coherent mental image of the woman. It almost made Temple nauseous

In an effort to calm her own mind she shift her skim to the next mind which was Cassie and immediately her nausea vanished. Cassie's mind was still frenetic in her thinking but not anywhere to the level of Deezy. It was like taking a palette cleanser.

 

Almost with reluctance she shifted to Ryan for a surface skim, since neither Deezy nor Cassie had seemed to notice her peering inside their heads. Ryan was very regimented and orderly no stray thoughts or fantasies. At least none on the surface.

 

Suddenly she looked at Davian and remembered what he had said about worries and legalities. She didn't know how she felt about that. Ever since the powers had come to her she had used them for her own purposes and as she liked. It hadn't occurred to her that she might be doing wrong. Right now she was feeling guilty and sort of ashamed for prying into the minds of these people who had been nothing but kind and accepting.

 

Temple moved a little closer to Davian as if for protection, < Should I tell them? > she asked Davian through her link to the one person she really trusted now.

 

 

 

 

[SalmonMax]

Deezy's black plastic visor seemed to gaze thoughtfully at Cassandra. With Ryan's words, it wasn't hard to deduce what the new hire meant by 'pro.'

 

"Hearing and eye pro, eh? Sure. What level of pro do we need? Shop class?"

 

There were four sets of plastic goggles on the table, along with sets of earplugs.

 

"Thermobarics?"

 

Four sets of full face-masks with heavily darkened quartz lenses and full-ear coverings appeared.

 

"Nuclear detonation?"

 

And then, bizarrely, a refrigerator appeared at the far end of the conference room table.

 

"Something in between? Watchu packin' giiiiirl?"

[Nina]

Temple suddenly barked a silly laugh and pointed at the refrigerator.

 

"I get that!"

 

Deezy looked at the other newcomer and smiled and nodded at her giving her two thumbs up.

[Malachite]

Davian gave an amused look at Cassie's expression. Mentally he shifted a few things around in how he saw the pyrotechnic woman fitting in to Novastorm. At Temple's timid question, he gave her a brief glance. <Would it help, do you think? Or just make them uncomfortable and distrustful now?> His mental voice was without judgement, prodding her to think on the question instead of just giving an emotional response. He gave her a few seconds to sit with that before adding, <It's done now. If it makes you feel guilty, don't look without their permission unless your need is greater than your guilt.>

 

"I think I need to invest in RFID stickers for the building," he rumbled in amusement. "Something a little less. . .percussive on the building." A thought occurred to him and he gave Deezy the grin she and Ryan had learned meant 'I have a challenge you'll like' for their resident mad scientist. "Deezy, could you make nanite-infused paint? Something people could get in different colors, paint their house or business in, that would allow VR and AR integration as well as anything else you could program into the bots? Color changes for outdoor thermal paint. Minor ding repairs or a security alarm system. . .y'know, whatever you can come up with?"

[SalmonMax]

"Davian!" Deezy said, and pounded her fist on the table. "I like the way your brain-meats think. The answer is yes...kind of."

 

She started pulling on the AR gloves, trying to wiggle them off of her hands.

 

"The thing with nanotech is that it's very specific in what it can do. Each kind of nanobot can only do one thing well, because it has to be custom built to do that thing. So a paint that could do ALL of that would have, like, dozens of different types of nanite in it, and it'd be a pain for a lot of reasons... But I think something LIKE that could work? Or...or layers... Onion houses. VR AR tags over the construction, then your color changing, then on top of everything you have the solar collectors."

 

She paused thoughtfully. "You could actually mix them up though, in a pot, and then have the controller automatically sort them when they get activated. So yeah, a paint could work...it'd be kinda complicated, and it'd have a higher rate of error than integration at the manufacturing side, but it'd mean you could retrofit it to existing houses which is a plus..."

 

There was a clatter as the gloves finally came off and fell onto the table. She wiggled her fingers and tugged at them, then reached up to undo the elaborate headset.

 

"It'll do until I can get a scaling GP nanofacturing process up and running, and at that point none of it will matter anyway. Good practice though!"

Edited March 25, 2020 by SalmonMax

[Exile_Jeane]

"...Woah," she exhaled softly at the act of spontaneous creation.

 

The tide of technobabble almost washed over Cassandra as she poked the closest plastic goggle with her bagel. It did nothing in reaction, and she quietly claimed one set of goggles and ear plugs, testing it for, well, weirdness with the fingers of her free hand. It belatedly occurred to her that they were talking about putting nanites in paint. That sounded like a classic bad idea, the kind that ended up with everyone grey-gooeified. Still, definitely was cool.

 

"Uh, to answer your question, these will do. I'm a hell of a lot stronger then a firework, but I was taught better than to set one off too close without testing it first. Made cacti and small rocks definitely Not Be, though," Cassandra laughed, "And the short-ranged version acts like a shaped-charge. Zero blowback even if I'm pretty sure I'm not immune to any secondary explosions I might set off. Got blown on my ass a couple times when I've missed. Pretty sure some of those clips are online by now."

 

She snorted in amusement, "Yeah, I haven't exactly been hiding, putting on shows at rest stops. Had to make gas and food money somehow. I don't have a fireworks license yet, but easier to ask for forgiveness than permission..."     

[Nina]

1 hour ago, Malachite said:

<Would it help, do you think? Or just make them uncomfortable and distrustful now?> His mental voice was without judgement, prodding her to think on the question instead of just giving an emotional response. He gave her a few seconds to sit with that before adding, <It's done now. If it makes you feel guilty, don't look without their permission unless your need is greater than your guilt.>

 

Temple was a bit surprised that Davian didn't do the 'adult' thing and tell her what to do. This made her stop and really think about what he had said. If she told them they might become afraid and not want anything to do with her, which much to her surprise she didn't want o have happen. She weighed things like she had been taught in school to look at  the pros and cons and so she only partially followed what they were doing and talking about.  Then something Cassie said caught her attention.

 

18 minutes ago, Cassandra Durrant said:

"Yeah, I haven't exactly been hiding, putting on shows at rest stops. Had to make gas and food money somehow. I don't have a fireworks license yet, but easier to ask for forgiveness than permission..."    

 

This brought a smile to Temple's face and she stepped over to the goggle and ear plug table. She picked a set of each and turned back to Davian and the other two Novastorm owners, "Can I come?"

 

She had made up her mind, after all as Cassie said it's " easier to ask for forgiveness than permission..."    

 

[SalmonMax]

Deezy pointed at Cassandra, then looked at Temple.

 

"Yes," she said to Temple.

 

Then she managed to get the catches undone and popped the visor off of her head. Whatever they might have thought she looked like, the truth was surprisingly unremarkable. Red hair was a little unusual, but nothing particularly weird. And she wasn't a chiseled goddess or even particularly noteworthy in looks. Hazel eyes, some freckles. Normal stuff.

 

She blinked and squinted and looked around the room. "That is gonna need alot more work," and then immediately focused on Cassie and Temple again.

 

"That is TRUE...unless you're asking for forgiveness from a jail cell. There's...lines. You know?"

 

"Now. LETS BLOW SOME STUFF UP!"

[Shameless]

Ryan took some of the protective gear as well, and nodded.  "Of course you can Temple."   The two older stormers seemed to be quite nice, hell all three founders seemed to be, and he shrugged.   "There's truth to the saying, though I'd advise you to not live by it."

With Deezy's announcement, he sighed.  "Alright, Alright.  Still since Danny did go through the trouble, is anyone still hungry before we go?"

The eyes of several went to the food and about five minutes  passed, as they ensured it didn't go to waste.   One empty table later, Ryan opened a portal to a stretch of beach on the Gulf coast and followed everyone through.   "The surrounding thousand acres is all ours, it's fenced in, and marked.  Here we can be free to test whatever we like."

[Exile_Jeane]

Earplugs and goggles in place, Cassandra gave a nod and pointed at a rock roughly 250 feet away, miming the recoil of a gun. There was a heartbeat where the bouncing chaos of her thoughts froze and blinked, a bullet in the launch tube of her mind. A halo of distorted air pressure and twinkling lights bloomed around her head, and then... There was no rock. A small mushroom cloud of fire and smoke consumed it entirely, leaving a scorched crater in it's wake. Waiting for the last of the blast to fade, the bombshell brunette intoned mock seriously, "Bada."

 

A second finger gun pointed at a second rock presaged a second halo and a second blast. A bit closer and that much louder, it almost obscuring Cassandra's small little benediction, "...Boom."

 

She turned around to face the group, an exultant smile on her lips and wind blowing her hair in her face. Awesome. Hadn't fumbled it yet, hopefully wouldn't today. Confidence, Cassie, confidence! Confidence and focus now that it was showtime. Stretching her arms in front of her palms out in an outward lack of concern, she chuckled, "...Yup, blowing shit up and looking good doing it. That's what I'm working with. Nothing tricksy about it I've found so far." 

Edited March 26, 2020 by Exile_Jeane
Upgrading

[SalmonMax]

Deezy laughed while shielding her eyes from the glare in her goggles with her hand as chunks of rock pattered back down to the sand. After a second or three she applauded and whirled to face Cassandra.

 

"Good warm up!" she enthused, "But we are a long way from done. Safety first..."

 

A transparent acrylic blast shield with what looked like aluminum bracing and struts appeared for people to stand behind.

 

"Now." The redhead looked over at Cassandra measuringly. "We're going to science the heck out of this. UNfortunately the Reinforced Electromagnetic Anomaly and Physical Energy Research labs aren't ready yet, so we'll make do with what we have. Uh, go stand over...there." She pointed. "I'm gonna make a few objects for trials, and give you instructions for what to do with each one. Later on we'll do a better workup, but this will give us some preliminary results."

 

When Cassie took her mark, the tests began. The first was really weird. A big block of some dull grey metal, with a tank of what looked like water between it and Cassandra.

 

"Start by blowing up the lead block. Not the water. I wanna see if there's some kind of force or projectile that passes through the space between you. Oh wait, hang on." Deezy scurried over and checked the readings on something attached to the tank, then hurried away behind the blast screen.

 

"Go!"

 

The next minutes went basically that way. Cassandra found herself unleashing her powers on an array of blocks of different substances, from lead to iron to steel to glass...and at one point just a big tank of water. Then she tried blowing things up at different ranges, from close enough to feel the concussion a little, to far enough away that it was hard to make the target out. Then she tested precision, having Cass blow up small parts of larger targets. Each time, after the test, Deezy would run out and make measurements of the results, and jotted them into a little tablet before running back behind cover for the next set.

 

After the tenth such trial though, Cassandra could feel the telltale dizziness starting to kick in, along with the clammy feeling  warning that it was going to start to hurt to do it anymore. On hearing that Deezy called off the remaining fifty trials to schedule later, in manageable chunks. The test area was a mess of craters and melted chunks of different metals.

 

When Cassie returned to the others, Deezy was bouncing on the balls of her feet as she eagerly scrolled around on her tablet. She looked up with a big grin and said, "I hope you like doing that! I mean, that could literally just be your job. For...like...a long time. Just blowing things up. For science." With a quick look at Davian she quickly gestured and shook her head. "I'm just kidding! Dav and Ryan will work that out, I'm not in HR for a reason...ha ha ha..."

 

With her back turned to them though her expression turned serious and she mouthed, "really though" and gave Cass a thumbs up.