"Finally!" Damien yelled out, startling Kastra and Adrenna who were inside the bouncing cart, watching him, Garrett, and Marci all work on the metal device before them.
A week and a half passed from the moment they'd left Eleram, and Damien let out a sigh of content as he stared at the finished prototype. Sitting around a foot in thickness in all directions, Eleria's very first alternator lay before them.
Working with iron had been the largest issue he'd encountered since his two Fae, while a bit less so than their kin, still didn't enjoy being in its presence. Unfortunately, it was the most useful metal for magnetizing, so it was a necessary evil and luckily, it was only on the inside of the machine since the exterior was silver.
The process had been exhausting and not at all as exciting as Damien had hoped. Almost every day had been spent with him, his father, Marci, and Kastra preparing the copper he'd picked up over the past few months into a useable wire. He'd expected it to be difficult, the few times he'd attempted to bend metal before, Eira and Kiara a prime example, took a lot more effort than regular stone or dirt, but he hadn't expected it to take an entire week and two days. And then, after molding each and every single ounce of it by mental hand, he'd had to insulate the wires they made.
Damien had worked with tons of copper wire in his past life, but after this, he never wanted to see the metal again.
"Well, turn it on," Garrett said impatiently, sitting on the opposite side of the machine.
"Yes! Activate the device! I must see!" Marci excitedly squealed from atop Damien's head.
They were all sitting on the floor around it, watching Damien put the finishing touches onto it. He'd just finished running the last two larger wires leading out and away from the cube-shaped object, giving him somewhere to pull out the energy that would be created. He left the two copper wires a centimeter apart so that, in the event he could alter its volatility, it would arc.
"I don't exactly 'turn it on,' but-"
"Stop stalling and make it work, Human!" Marci interrupted, smacking her small hand into the top of his head. "I did not obediently sit for hours molding stupid metal for nothing! Show me!"
Damien smiled and nodded. Marci had been excessively helpful the entire project, especially once he promised to make one for her in the future. Hardly complaining at all, she'd sat next to Kastra on the floor of the cart, thinning large chunks of copper down to wire just like the rest of them, except much more efficiently. Alexa, Emily, and Vanessa had all quit after the first few hours of it, but Marci had held true. If she hadn't, he didn't even want to know how long it might have taken instead.
Damien sent his mana into the familiar device to finally activate it. He'd practiced turning the internal rotor many times, but had never sent an electrical charge into the iron poles he'd used for magnets, though he'd used the ability quite often with his swords.
Once he had them rotating, Damien targeted every other pole to hold a positive charge on its outer surface, while the respective pole next to it held negative. With ten poles, it should generate quite a sufficient amount of electricity at low rotational speeds, but managing to keep the poles charged correctly was going to be a hassle when they rotated so quickly. Just handling these ten at low speeds, Damien already realized that it would be nearly impossible to keep his attention this split during a fight. Making a magnetic spell to handle the task in the future was going to be imperative.
They'd used all the copper they'd collected on the wires coiled along the outside of the unit, leaving it very open for airflow since it was going just to be a test. In fact, he'd hardly used any silver to mount the wiring to. The unit was bare; anyone who touched it would receive an unpleasant sensation.
They hadn't needed any wires inside the center rotor that spun the poles for the electromagnet since he could supply that part himself with the iron to latch his energy to, so the exterior was loaded down with almost four times as much copper as a typical truck's alternator. Excitingly, to Damien, that meant that if he kept other aspects of the generator the same, it would produce a substantial amount more than any average one from Earth. Though, even without the extra copper, it was already going to generate more power because he was using two and a half times more magnetic poles on top of the extra wire, was able to increase the magnetic strength almost endlessly and on a whim, and had instant control over the speed of the rotor's rotation.
Additionally, all of that was only in the event it was regulated to output a certain amount of voltage and current, which units on earth were to prevent frying of circuit boards attached to the unit. Damien left his unregulated because, well, any and all natural power was useful to him. He could immediately harness all of it to utilize, so why even consider toning down parts of it and bottlenecking the output?
"Alright, here we go" Damien said, spinning the internal parts faster once he got the hang of keeping the poles charged.
He was only applying a tiny amount of magnetic charge currently, just getting the hang of the moving parts and different tasks. He didn't need to throw volatile electricity into the mix just yet.
The onlookers stared over his shoulder expectantly, waiting for something to happen as the metal began to hum. Damien wasn't sure how fast he had it spinning as of yet, so he stopped at a comfortable buzzing that reminded him of experiments he'd done as a kid.
"Ok, I'm going to increase the strength of the magnets," he stated, getting a nod from everyone else in the cart.
With the rotor still turning quickly, Damien increased the mana flow around the iron poles and charged them with minuscule increments of additional mana, bringing the magnets up to a very basic level of strength. Basic being the weight of himself, plus his father hanging off two pieces of magnetized metal he'd attached to the coaches ceiling to determine how strong they should start.
Instantly, he felt the tiniest of reactions from the stationary copper wires as waves of energy began moving around them.
Damien gasped.
"Oh my god... It's... unlike anything I've ever felt," he mumbled.
Thousands of millions of infinitesimal static charges had begun to move through and over the outside of the many wires, and they'd gotten large enough that Damien could feel them moving around as if tv static had been imprinted onto them. He slowly began increasing the strength of his magnet and watched as the charges he could feel began enlarging, becoming more erratic and demanding purpose.
Expecting the voltage was going to stay too low to arc across, Damien grabbed ahold of some of the power already in the lines and manipulated its base form into a large spike of voltage all at once. Finally, the first loud snap from the wires arcing happened, only assisted by his ability to change its property to be more volatile.
"Oh my gods," Garrett exclaimed under his breath, staring intently at the two wires extending from the top of their device. "You swear you aren't doing that?"
"He is, and he isn't. I can feel it," Marci declared seriously, staring mesmerized at the arcing as it stabilized into a solid line of bright white electricity.
"What do you mean?" Garrett replied.
"It feels like he's... changing it? But none of it is mana born," Marci explained, getting a nod back from Damien.
"It's strong as is, and I can immediately utilize it, but for demonstration, one aspect of the energy is much too low. I'm resisting its partner in order to create a sudden spike. If I increase the distance..."
Damien moved his hand toward the loudly popping wires to pull them apart, then yanked his arm backward in great surprise as he was shocked for the second time since coming to this world. He stared down at his hand in wonder before he began to giggle, a slight burn mark adorning where the energy had arched to his middle finger.
His mana had changed the base form of the electricity, but he hadn't done anything other than that. He hadn't taken control of the energy leaving the alternator, and he'd paid for it.
"This is amazing," he muttered, coating his hand in a layer of saturated electrons to prevent another shock before spacing the two wires apart slightly further.
Immediately, the noise got louder until it disappeared entirely, having pulled the points too far apart for the spiking voltage to cross. Damien began increasing the force of the magnets again until the sound returned, undeniably louder than it was before, yet only having spaced the wires another centimeter apart.
The copper began heating up, so he began manipulating air through the unit to cool and stabilize the heat. While doing that, he saw in his peripheral Marciela reaching forward from his head while getting lighter, as if she were about to fly toward it.
"Don't touch it," he immediately cautioned.
"Why not... It's so..." she asked, trailing off.
"Would you want to touch Alexa or me when coated with lightning?" he asked back. "This might actually hurt more than that right now. Just... don't touch it."
She nodded and he smiled again at her obedience before refocusing on the unit in front of them all. The test was absolutely thrilling him. When he spiked it, the voltage had to be somewhere beyond fifty thousand right now. Whether or not it was sustainable, he knew that with this constant source of power and the minimal amount of drain it caused on his mana to spin, cool, and magnetize... He was about to become an absolute powerhouse, literally.
'Creating my own lightning strike on whim might be feasible in the future, if I can make a large enough device...'
Damien's own energy and what he could create with his mana was strong, incomparable to other people's lightning on this planet, sure, but it couldn't compare with the raw destruction a naturally occurring lightning bolt created in just a few microseconds. His best option was still to pin someone down and force a natural strike to land on them, but that was impractical in a fight. If he could store enough energy in a battery or himself, or better yet, produce enough energy with a vast enough alternator to mimic a strike's power on a whim, Damien wouldn't have an equal on this planet any longer.
'Something the size of the Hoover Dam, or bigger, working more efficiently, on my finger,' he drooled out in his mind.
Those plans would have to wait for the far off future, though. For now, Damien was already satisfied with what was before him.
Moving his hands above the alternator, Damien pulled the energy up and out of it. A miniscule line of blueish-white energy followed his hands up and away from the whirring metal box, and slowly sapped into his fingertips, sinking beneath his skin and becoming his to utilize. Damien laughed incredulously as those around him continued staring on silently.
"I'm going to increase the output again," Damien stated, once again moving the rods further apart.
Grabbing ahold of his ambition though, he instead slowed down the rotation of the rotor. Faster speeds and a stronger magnet would increase the output of energy, but whereas he could increase the speed to extremely variable levels with ease, if he accidentally went too far on the magnet, it could crumple the device in on itself without warning. He wanted to know what that limit was, so he knew exactly where not to take the magnetic field past.
Bringing the rotation down until it was barely moving, Damien began to increase the strength of the forces inside of his alternator, utilizing the energy it had created to power its electromagnets, only taking his concentration and not mana to accomplish. Twice as strong as they had been, three times, four times... the magnets steadily climbed in strength until Damien wasn't even sure if he was doing anything.
"It's almost at... fifteen times as strong as at the start, I thi-"
"Watch out!" Garrett yelled at the same moment a pair of daggers came ripping through one of Emily's bags from almost four feet away, aimed directly for the device.
The daggers created a loud pinging noise as they slammed into the prototype, then a clang when Damien cut power to it and stopped rotating it altogether. Breathing a sigh of relief that he wasn't in their path, he backed up slightly.
"I forgot about surrounding metal..." Damien admitted, staring at the dagger on the floor. "That seems like what will limit the unit, unless I generate an opposing magnetic field that can counteract the one I make inside..." he trailed off, mumbling.
"Everything alright back here?" Emily called out from the door.
Damien lifted his head and saw her hanging off the side of the coach as it traveled down the dirt highway, his dad standing up quickly in response.
"Would you stop doing stuff like that," his dad grumbled, pulling Emily inside the cart and resting his hand on her slightly protruded belly. "No sense in risking this potentially SANE child because your other one almost dismembered himself, again."
"Feeling the love, dad."
"Honestly. He takes after you and from what I can gather, his other mom way too heavily," Garrett concluded, ignoring Damien who began reaching for the daggers.
Damien saw Emily grin widely out of the corner of his eyes, pecking her husband on the cheek and sweeping her eyes around the coach to survey it. Finally, they landed on him and narrowed as he held the daggers in his hands, constantly turning the magnet on and off at varrying strengths to attempt to determine how far it would pull.
"Now I have to resharpen those," she lamented. "What are you doin-"
"I know, I'm sorry. I can do it for you," Damien replied absentmindedly, setting the daggers on the ground about two feet away from the alternator.
Damien once again activated his iron pole magnets. Resting his hands over the device this time to accurately control each and every increase, he slowly brought the force up incrementally until finally, the knives twitched.
Damien stood up and backed away, everyone else in the cart too absorbed in what he was doing to interrupt and backing away as well. Once far enough, he very minutely increased the pull, but that was enough. The daggers broke free from gravity and friction, launching inward and colliding with the alternator.
"Perfect," he muttered.
Releasing the iron from its magnetism, he gave the daggers to his mother to hold and then had her back away with them.
"This is about as strong as I can make the magnets without affecting things around it too much. I don't know when it will start arcing this time, but I know it'll be loud," Damien stated. "I know I shouldn't have to say this, but do not touch the wires leaving the top of it right now, or the copper wires coiled around it."
He looked around the room and everyone nodded at his gaze, so he turned back to the unit and slowly began rotating the centerpiece. Instantly, he felt numerous electrons surging at the call of the magnets, begging to be utilized. He got it spinning in sync with the seconds on a clock, then increased it to twice that. Surprisingly, using a tempo like in his music assisted him here, trying to regulate the speed of the device.
"So that's... around three hundred revolutions per minute," Damien muttered to himself.
He slowly increased the pace of his rotor until it doubled, then tripled the speed. The heat the device began putting off because of the energy it was harnessing and creating began to become a little too much for the air cooling to handle. Damien began expending trace amounts of his mana in response to rapidly cool the air he was sending through the coils. It was the first real unnecessary expenditure of mana that would only get worse as it heated more and more.
"...that you mention... noise scared the..."
"Near... or at one thousand?" he questioned himself, briefly hearing and interrupting his mother murmuring something as he kept trying to spike the energy inside the wires. "Then this should be around one thousand, one hundr-"
Finally, a loud pop, as if the world's largest belt had slammed into a tile floor with extreme force, exploded outward from the device, while a blinding flash left a zig-zagging white line of light behind when Damien closed his eyes.
Blinking hard, he cut the alternator off just in time for the coach to screech to a halt, throwing the metal, Damien, and from the sounds of it, a few others in the cart against the front wall. A loud bang sounded out from the metal and his body slamming into the wooden wall. He felt something small hit his chest as his hair received a light tugging. The coach then lurched in the other direction, causing the heavy metal device to start sliding back to the other side, while a hand shoved onto Damien's shoulder, pinning him against the wall behind him and causing him to stay put while the tugging on his hair changed direction and a shadow covered his vision.
"Blehhhhh," came the non-verbal complaint from directly in front of him.
When Damien's eyes cleared up enough to see, he opened them to Marci dragging her body upward from where she'd flipped downward in front of his face. Looking down to his chest, Kastra stared back up at him with concern on her face. Glancing forward showed Adrenna squatting directly before him, face inches from his as she kept him from continuing to bounce around the cart that had lurched to a stop.
Tilting his head to the left to avoid her flirtatious grin, Damien looked past her just as Marci flopped onto the top of his head and saw his mom braced against the door and seats, holding onto Garrett by his shoulder as well and keeping him pinned in between her and the wall.
He wanted to laugh at his dad's damsel in distress looking state, but realized he was in the exact same situation.
'Why are the women in our lives the strong ones who always save us,' he laughed inwardly, making eye contact with his father as they grimaced at one another.
"Yeah, Vanessa said it was scaring the horses and to stop-"
"Would you STOP THAT!" a voice scream from outside, interrupting his mom as the coach jostled, door wretching open moments later.
Vanessa had moved up the side steps and appeared in the doorway, eyes holding zero mirth or interest. She began gazing around the interior of the coach with the coldest expression he'd ever seen on her adorn, looking down on all in the cart.
Damien felt Adrenna shudder and saw his mother avert her gaze, causing a cold sweat to build up on his back. When the Celestial's eyes landed on him, he felt Adrenna's hand disappear along with her presence, and Marci's weight go along with it.
Staring into the abyss before him, Damien realized for the first time in his life that fury was not the most terrifying expression a person could show.
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The Human's slave-driven elaborate wooden box came to a halt, and Marci flew out of the interior, relieved to be away from the thing. It was stuffy inside and completely lacking any form of entertainment, especially since the winged witch had banned them from experimenting inside of it.
Some complaint about their dumb animals frightening... It was of no importance to her. The fun was gone. The experimenting. It was a love she and the boy shared, along with his father, and why she'd taken to him so quickly in the first place all those years ago.
This tale has been unlawfully lifted without the author's consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.
He'd had the interest to trust Fae so openly at the beginning, why wouldn't the rest of his exploits be just as intriguing?
Quickly harnessing the mana around her, as natural as breathing, she shot forward toward the many wooden boxes all in a long line before her, a manic grin on her face. Ice under this foot, fire on that torch handle, soot smiley on his forehead... she darted through the wheels and people, wreaking havoc on any who happened to be in her line.
Finally, she spotted her favorite prey, twenty feet in front of her. Larger than her favorite slave, who had grown quite large lately, this beast of a woman stood around seven feet tall and had a pairing of horns protruding from the top of her head.
Marci was no fool. She had recognized immediately that this woman detested Fae when they were being categorized by her at check-in. In fact, Marci was even willing to leave this monstrosity of a sentient alone for the gist of the trip, no matter how interesting, because it meant that the interesting slaves she acquired all those years ago would be happier and have more time to show her neat things.
Alas, that was not to be, as the brute before her had insulted her prestigious race with the back of the line: an insufferable affront.
If Marci and Kastra were to be judged so harshly, she had to live up to expectations.
Surging forward, Marci activated the glamour she so rarely used of late and flew between the woman's legs, singeing the leather knots holding the plates she had strapped to her shins so that they became a mess of melted leather. She darted upward after, along the curvy body line, dodging the two mountains in her path, before creating a blade of ice in front of her hands and dashing through the hair that had flicked in front of her ascent.
"ARGH!" a bellow echoed out. "YOU LITTLE PEST!"
"Hair for me, none for you!" Marci called back down with a giggle.
This was her favorite part of the day, every day, and it was only that much sweeter because of her boredom throughout the cart rides now.
"GET DOWN HERE, YOU'RE DEAD," the Minotaur bellowed, causing Marci to dance to the left to avoid spittle that was launched upward at her.
"Don't think I like that plan, I don't," Marci sang back, floating higher and examining the area.
They were getting closer to the mountains every day, roughly halfway there by now. Another month and they'd be back in Hathen. If she knew the nearby forest better, she'd like to explore it. But alone, she would have to postpone that plan.
The creature below continued to yell as Marci saw Damien leaving the coach, causing her to smile. He was almost finished, or they were. Soon she would have to shrink the devices, perhaps today, even! She couldn't wait to see how they turned out, and the bubbly mirth inside her mind and body just BEGGED to be released somehow.
"IF LEMSHIRE DIDN'T EXPRESSLY STATE YOU WERE ALLOWED HERE, I'D HAVE KICKED YOUR ENTIRE DAMN PARTY OUT LONG AGO. I'M GONNA..."
Humans, Goblins, Dogs, Cats, Elves, and a Brinter all murmured around the yelling mountain as Marci smiled back down at them all.
There was only one thing to do with such bubbly mirth.
Yes. Only one thing.
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Damien heard a bestial roar, this one possibly the loudest since they'd begun their journey, at the same interval as usual once the caravan came to a stop.
"Marci should be back soon," he wondered aloud as he descended out of the cart and Emra came bounding up to him, feeling each of her steps feedback through the sense he'd created by listening to the vibrations of the earth.
He'd made a habit out of utilizing it for almost all occasions on land, a better way of being able to tell someone's location than mana sense was if it was being blocked or saturated by the other's mana. So long as they weren't moving faster than the speed of sound, depending on what material they were standing on, that is.
"I wish she'd stop upsetting the Caravan lead," his dad stated, following him out and ducking his head.
"It's all those damn... Most, most of the Fae can think to do," Vanessa corrected, hopping down from the coach driver's seat as Kastra flit over to her shoulder.
When she spoke, more than a few in their party flinched a bit, her outburst still fresh in their minds. Her jumping down from the carriage hadn't exactly helped that situation either and Damien was pretty sure his dad thought a bird of prey was descending upon him.
"She is holding back in her own way," Kastra stated factually, shrugging and leaning against the Celestial who awkwardly nodded.
Damien smiled inwardly at her strange expression and kneeled down, hugging the giant Sylphen that had just pressed its nose to his stomach.
She'd been getting restless sitting in the coach the entire trip, so they'd been periodically letting her out to run around the carriage while they traveled. He was surprised at how fast she was getting, merely trotting to keep pace with them and sprinting from one end to the other to exercise and play.
Her head was level with his when kneeling and, smart as she was, she refrained from licking his face as he didn't like it, instead placing a wet kiss on his shoulder and neck. He scratched her soft, thick white fur behind her ears and around her neck, amazed at how quickly she'd been growing. Just a little less than a year and already she was more than half his height.
"Did my baby have a good day running?" he cooed, causing her to get excited just like any puppy back on Earth would. "Did she? Yes she did."
"He's doing it again," someone sighed out.
"Yes she had the best-"
"I wish he wouldn't."
"-day ever," he continued, ignoring the embarrassed looks from his group as others nearby shot questioning gazes toward them.
A bit of feedback indicated someone approaching just as a hand gripped his shoulder. Looking up, Damien probably would have tensed at who it was like the rest of them if it weren't for the forewarning his abilities had given him.
"Stop, no, woe is me, my beautiful temptress. I have given my chastity to my wives. You can't have what's left without their permis-"
A hand cut him off as Alexa ran into him from behind, causing Emra to jump up and out of the way as she wrapped both her hands around his mouth and he barely caught himself from tumbling forward.
"Who's permission, you pervert!" Alexa growled. "Ignore him, Van-"
Again, Damien's body was moved in another direction against his will as he was stolen from Alexa by the earlier hand that had gripped him. His vision was blanked out by the sight of white feathers, reminding him of a time from his youth something similar had happened, as a pair of arms wrapped him in a hug and a pair of wings wrapped him in a fortress. It always felt so safe in here, even though now he was taller than his castle.
"I'll work on them," a voice whispered seductively from behind, causing Damien to shudder and Alexa to send slight panic through the bond, which ultimately made him end up laughing. "So bold until called out, tsk tsk Damien. And you forget I've known this one for longer than you, Alexa. You needn't attack him every time he jokes around."
He heard some muffled complaining outside the wings and felt a nose sniffing between his legs, curious about where its master had gone.
Looking down, Emra stared back up at him, confused. He wanted to laugh, but now was probably not the best time to.
"Thanks for not-"
Damien turned around and cut off the whisper, pulling Vanessa into his chest to give her a tight hug and kiss the top of her head. She'd tensed up briefly, but then relaxed and hugged him back, causing him to smile in response.
"I'm glad, I meant to apologize but-"
"You forget I've known you a while too," he interrupted. "You don't scare me, remember?"
The result of her sending everyone into a panic the other day was an awkward few days, everyone too tense to be jovial except Emily and Kastra. Damien was miserable, unable to experiment or do anything while in the cart, and Marci was making it worse by constantly whining. He'd actually willingly gone running alongside Emra a couple of times to stave off the boredom.
Unfortunately, this had created a bit of a divide between him and Vanessa. He was planning on doing something about it today, but it seemed the Celestial beat him to it.
"You were white as a sheet, you liar."
"I forgot I'd left our windows open at the house," he replied instantly, deadpan expression.
A soft chuckle came from beneath him as he felt a head press into his chest.
"You checked the house at least five times before-"
"Ahhh, totally forgot I left one open. Was so nervous. I hope they close it," he interrupted, staring upward and lamenting his supposed carelessness in a monotone voice.
It got silent for a moment and the shaking from her laughter died down. Damien figured he'd quelled the older woman's worry that she'd alienated him like everyone else and moved to step away.
"You have my vote, so that's one of us," Kastra called out suddenly.
The figure in his arms froze and Damien's smile became wider, having forgotten his little wife was on the woman's shoulder. Then, his smile dropped when he realized what she'd said and the woman he was hugging lost her nervousness and relaxed again.
"Well, that's one down. Don't complain when I take you up on your offer earlier," Vanessa said, causing him to develop another cold sweat as she removed her wings and moved off toward where Emily was to help set up their camp.
Damien's sweat disappeared as he laughed out at her exaggerated hip movements, whistling at her and glancing over to see Alexa blushing next to him. The show was more for her than himself if Damien knew his second favorite Celestial well enough.
"Hey!" Damien called after her. "Does this mean I can experiment inside agai- kidding! Obviously, very much kidding!" he yelled, holding up his hands in surrender as a miasma seemed to emanate from Vanessa's body and Kastra abandoned ship off her toward Alexa.
He swore she must be using some form of mind magic to accomplish that, but wasn't sure what. She never seemed to be using any mana. Perhaps she really was just terrifying.
"Project ho!" A voice screeched out at that moment, causing those from the carts in front of them to scatter as a purple comet streaked into Damien's hair. "Build it! Finish it! It's time!"
"It is, you're right," he replied sagely, expecting her, but not the bubbles that started dropping down in front of his vision. "Jesus, Marci, why are you covered in purple bubbles? They're stick- You know what? I don't care," he stated, stopping the inquisition.
He had a feeling he wouldn't want to know the answer anyway. Plausible deniability and all.
"HENCHMAN ALEXA, RETRIEVE THE- ok, ok, I'll get it, I love you," Damien corrected as a glance at Alexa showed irritation from earlier.
No one was appreciating his antics, but he was too happy to care.
He moved into the carriage to get their supplies and poked his head out one last time.
"SorryYourAuntIsSoIntoMe!" he called out before ducking his head inside.
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"Alright, let us begin," Damien stated.
"Is this really going to work?" his mother asked.
The family had gathered for the final part, both excited and nervous to be around him when he worked on this project. Unlike when he practiced lightning magic that was under his control, this was all natural and uncontrolled. It was right for them to be nervous about it.
"In theory..." he muttered.
Before them all lay several pieces of a whole that would all fit together snugly.
Firstly, the top. Like a crescent moon but three dimensional, it's inside shaped like a U rather than flat, this outer half of the casing was hollow and made out of silver with three small holes at its upper and outer-most spot. It looked like a loosely bent in half piece of paper that had its ends pulled downward to form an n, its inner portion hollow and awaiting the three-phase copper wiring that would get set into it. Inside the U, large, circular holsters awaited the wire that would be bent and set into them.
Looking at his creation with a smile, Damien suddenly paled.
"I screwed up," he stated.
'HOW COULD I FORGET THE INSULATION FOR THE MOST CRITICAL SPOT!'
Silence permeated the area for a brief few seconds, no one wondering what was going through his mind as Damien screamed himself internally.
He'd forgotten to prepare some form of insulation for the mounts that would hold the wire. While the copper wires themselves had a very thin layer of rubber around them, a rare commodity he'd found in Eleram thankfully, he'd completely forgotten to get any for the mounting pieces. If there was any slight tear in a wire somewhere and the charge leaked onto the inner silver of the ring, it would overly complicate how he would go about retrieving the electricity generated, and potentially shock him if he wasn't careful.
The three holes at the top were where the copper wires would extend bare, allowing him to extract the electricity easily. If it got out inside the ring-
'No, wait... how am I even going to ensure the energy doesn't arc from the wires to the outside silver!' he screamed out in his mind again.
When the energy built up enough, it wouldn't matter how much insulation he had inside the ring. It would freely jump to the ring and remove his easy access from the three small wire protrusions. Easy enough to capture the energy escaping from one small location, but in a fight, could he honestly say he could grasp it from a million different points all at once all over the ring?
"Damien?" his dad asked. "What do you mean? Did we forget something?"
"No, I forgot something," Damien sighed out, collapsing to the ground on his butt. "I'm trying to think..."
He sat, holding his knees for a moment. The dilemma was real.
Indistinct murmuring began around him as his brain worked in overdrive, begging to come up with a plan. He doubted Hathen had rubber, and even if they did, it would be too expensive.
He glanced up, away from his knees and back to the coach, hoping he'd accidentally bought too much rubber but knowing he didn't.
Then, inspiration struck. There, sitting at seven different places around their fancy coach, was some free, beautiful, clear, untainted insulation just waiting to be used.
Standing abruptly, Damien made his way towards the carriage.
As if sensing the desire and greed from the bond, a white-haired Celestial moved in his way.
"Sweetheart, what are you-"
"It has to be done," Damien stated firmly, continuing his steps.
"Just talk to me, what needs to be done?" Alexa asked trepidatiously.
"What is he doing?" he heard Emily call out as a few of his family members stood up and moved toward them and the coach.
'No! No turning back. They'd never understand me if they stop me here!' he screamed out inside, a scant fifteen feet from their coach.
Damien glanced downward at that moment, feigning shock.
"Lexi, your top-"
The moment she looked down, he created a gust of wind to blow up the blue skirt she'd chosen to wear today and bolted around her, sprinting for the carriage. He doubted he'd make it if she really wanted to stop him, begging in his mind that she wouldn't understand the severity of his need or care.
But the feedback from the bond made him cringe. He felt panic from her and unfortunately, a slight playfulness come through. In that moment, he knew he wouldn't make it before she grabbed him. He'd either have to try and fight her off, or make his case to his family and hope they'd let him dismember their carriage. If their almost violent disagreement to allowing Kastra or Adrenna to learn how to steer were any indication, he'd have to wait all the way until Hathen for some glass, and that was unacceptable.
Right when it felt like Alexa was going to pounce at his back, five feet away from the coach, he felt her body instead leave the ground and slide into it sideways a few feet away with a squeal.
"Kastra!?"
Damien wanted to kiss his Fae but instead jumped onto the steps of the carriage, slamming his arm through one of the closeby windows as it rippled like water and melded around his arm.
"What are you doing!" Emily shrieked from behind him.
"I need it!" Damien yelled back, disappearing inside and barricading the door with his earth magic.
"Take what's yours and give no quarter," he heard Marci scream in glee, no doubt loving this hectic developement.
"Dammit!" a feminine, muffled yell sounded as a hand pounded on his wall loudly.
"Don't hurt the coach, remember?" Damien yelled from inside as two of his hands blasted out the far side's two windows, then a third, the glass all liquifying and coalescing around his arms.
Right as he was pulling his arm back in, a hand latched onto his wrist and yanked his face into the wood around the window, trying to pull him through the much too small opening.
"Release your magic and put these windows back, now," his mother growled out.
"I need... the glassh," he begged out in reply, face smooshed against the inside of the carriage as his words muffled.
"You can't have it! Stop- what are you doing?" she asked suddenly, likely hearing the large creaking sound that had started emanating from the larger back window. "Damien Tearen, if you-"
"I need it!" he yelled, shattering the window in its entirety and making the pieces fly toward his body, melding with the other glass as it wrapped around his arms. "I'll fix it with what's left, I promise!" he said as the grip loosened and Emily let him go.
Glancing out the window briefly, he saw his mother collapse backward onto the ground, sitting with a look of despair on her face as she stared blankly at the carriage. Turning away, he moved back toward the door and rammed his arms through the last two unbroken windows. With a wave of his hand, the magic blocking the door was released and he saw his entire family standing outside besides his mother, staring at the cart incredulously. When she rounded the corner a moment later with a look of murderous contemplation, he almost returned everything back to how it was. Almost, until he saw his project laying behind them, and a struggling Alexa laying underneath a very large Kastra.
Taking a deep breath, he stepped down from the coach.
"Glass is an excellent insulator," he began, adopting the tone and manner of a professor from school, glass rippling around his arms. "When it's cool, that is. But it has to get very, very hot before it conducts. Luckily, it won't get that hot. But what it will do is be the perfect addition-"
"How are you doing that so easily?" his dad cut in, staring at his arms mesmerized as Damien walked past, poking the glass he'd formed around his forearms.
Damien cocked his head slightly and paused. Perhaps he'd misunderstood their looks of surprise. He thought they were angry as well, maybe they were just mesmerized.
'Except for mom. She's... she's pissed,' he reconfirmed, glancing at his mother briefly before beginning to walk again.
"Glass moves similar to a liquid," he stated firmly. "I mean, it doesn't flow fast at all, but it still flows. Knowing that, getting it to move and reform around your arms is just helping it restructure there without shattering like any metal or-"
"Gods, you're strange," Adrenna blurted out, causing most of his family to break free from their astonished states and nod in agreeance, a few chuckling.
Damien felt affronted, but no one was trying to stop him, so he moved on past them and stopped before his parts. Right before he knelt down, a hand caught him by the back of his neck.
"I'm guessing all this means you know how to FIX what you just BROKE," his mom growled out through gritted teeth.
He nodded very carefully.
"Once you are done here, you WILL spend the rest of your efforts on fixing MY coach, understood?"
Once again, he bobbed his head up and down, pushing the thought of mentioning that it was technically his and Alexa's out of his mind. The lioness let go of the firm yet not painful vice-grip of his neck and he resisted the urge to rub the sore spot. He mentally swore he'd make it up to her by making the carriage better than it was now someday.
Sitting down with him, he felt his mother's hand go from his neck to his side as they both rested on the ground comfortably next to one another. She began scratching him lightly, causing a smile to float across his face. All his family's eight interested pairs of eyes settled on him when he leaned forward, touching the crescent-shaped silver casings.
He willed a small amount of the glass on his arms to coat the inside tunnels of silver where the copper wire would go, needing hardly any to make it thick enough to be efficient. Deciding caution was the better route to take, he continued coating the entirety of the inside of the upper and lower crescent moon pieces before him, taking up a little more than a fifth of the glass he'd sapped from the carriage as the hand scratching his side gripped suddenly, a small stinging pain emanating from where it had been.
"Alright... now, the inner band," Damien declared, coating two more crescent pieces that had the U shape instead facing outward to connect to the outer band he'd already wrapped in glass.
Looking at the two pieces, he was certain they'd be safe from the inside, but there was no guarantee the electricity wouldn't arc outside...
'She's going to hate this,' Damien thought as he liberally applied the rest of the glass to the entire outside of the bands, coating almost every piece of silver in a thin layer of glass.
With normal alternators operating in normal ranges and regulators, this much caution wasn't necessary, but with the amount of power he'd planned to introduce or may need to utilize in the future... Damien assumed it was better to be safe than sorry here, even if safe here meant that his side was having the life squeezed out of it.
"You ok, mom?" he asked through gritted teeth, receiving a nod in return as he felt traces of liquid leaking from where she was squeezing his side.
Eyeing his dad, the man nodded and slowly pried her off him, causing his skin to tingle in appreciation at the removed pressure. With a sigh of relief, Damien continued his assembly by attaching his two outer crescent shapes, creating a circle with an opening on its inner side. He manipulated half the copper wire they'd bent into shape inside of the casing, resizing the silver holes that would hold them in place to be slightly larger to accommodate it all.
After twenty minutes, the wire was installed tightly and firmly in the upper reaches of his ring. Damien set the outer band down, filled to the brim with copper, and moved on to connect the two lower sections of the ring. Lifting them into the air, the two pieces seemed to seep into one another as he melded the silver and glass together seamlessly.
When finished with that step, he picked up a steel tray that looked like a ladder with large steps, all housing steel ball bearings he'd created in between the steps. Shaped like exaggerated capital I's, they prevented the balls from escaping while allowing them to rotate freely. He set it inside of his inner bands U and allowed it to settle into place before bending it around the outside in a circular, downward arc, connecting with itself on the other side of the ring and resizing it to fit perfectly.
"Ok, that will ensure this can rotate," Damien stated, finally grabbing another ladder-like assembly that instead of bearings, held twenty of the forty large iron triangular poles they'd created to receive his magnetism, set in alternating opposite directions.
Like before, he set it inside the inner band and this time directly attached the solid iron to parts of the steel casing holding the bearings. As he bent the new piece around the outside of the band, he continued to meld it to the bearing ladder until it was attached in its entirety. Finally, he thinned the lower steel piece outward until it nearly touched the glass on either side of the band's inner U.
After confirming the bearings let it have zero play in either direction, the steel plate unable to create friction by rubbing on the glass but also close enough to keep a greasing component in, Damien grabbed onto the triangular iron poles before him and shoved them downward. Like a water wheel or a giant prize wheel from an old show he used to watch, the contraption before him spun around the band with a hum, weight and ball bearings carrying them around without issue, almost effortlessly, as a game show beeping played in the back of his mind.
"Oh..." his dad mumbled out, eyebrows raising as the man watched the device work from the other side.
The large metal and glass donut hung in the air before his family rotating, most likely equal parts marvelous and confounding. He'd explained how it worked often to everyone, including Adrenna even, but the only ones who seemed to understand very simply how it would work were surprisingly Kastra, Marci, his dad, and Adrenna. Everyone else just accepted his words for what they were, staring on with blank expressions no matter how detailed he got with his explanation.
With the simple rotating and magnetizing units in place, Damien just had one last thing to do: attach the upper donut to the lower one. While this step would be more than a bit tricky in his old world, in this one, it was as simple as sliding the outer band over the top of the inner one, widening or slimming the top piece to fit the bottom.
With a wave of his hands, Damien lifted the top, circular piece off the ground and let it hover before him, a foot away from the lower piece that was still rotating. Together, the ring would be about two feet in diameter, eight inches wide, and four thick. It would be a bit bulky, even when sized down, but definitely worth all the trouble they were going through.
Damien flicked his wrists inward and the two pieces very gently began closing in on one another. When they finally touched, Damien was disappointed when he felt too much resistance and had to slightly widen the top band. The two pieces looked to be hovering next to each other for a moment until finally, the upper band devoured the lower and only one thicker ring remained in view of his family. Turning it to view it's side profile, everyone watched as the crack that separated the two pieces completely disappeared.
"Ohhh!" Marci yelled out, excited at the disappearance of the internal components. "That was interesting! It's all still rotating inside!" she yelled out in her tiny form from atop his head.
When she'd gotten there, he didn't know. He'd been too focused on the crafting.
"That was... extremely impressive," Alexa said from his left side, resting her hand on his thigh. "Good job. Does it work?"
"Yes!" Marci yelled. "Activate it! On! Go!"
"Let me get the internal pieces rounded off and equal in weight..." Damien muttered, squeezing Alexa's hand in excitement as he held himself back from a test run immediately.
Five minutes of tweaking the silver and steel pieces he'd put in to make sure they were of equal weight, and he was ready. Attaching three longer copper wires to the ones slightly protruding from the top so they had a better view, Damien set them about a centimeter from one another and begged for luck.
Taking control of the unit, he began to spin the internal pieces until it reached a stable and pleasant hum. He created a grease compound for the bearings, activated the magnets, and a natural spark of electricity lit up in the reflection of his eyes from the top portion of his first ring.