“Ruby.”

“Ruby.”

“Arcane flame.”

“Arcane flame.”

Arenya recalled many of these items from when they were experimenting before the trial. She was able to follow Cartalis’ work more easily now, at least. Well, if she wasn’t so exhausted, anyway.

“Mana conductor.”

“Mana c-”

“I’ve got it.”

There was also the presence of Zander. Arenya still wasn’t used to him being here, but true to his word, once he’d agreed to join in, he’d been here just as diligently as Arenya and Cartalis. It had taken him a couple days to refit his machine for ambient mana, but according to Cartalis, it worked extremely well.

Arenya had secretly been hoping that meant they could just measure out the required amount of crystal dust for the whole experiment and call it good, but the process turned out to still be extremely arduous. They had to fold in an exacting amount of dust, often requiring remeasuring two or three times, then treat the steel, then test the steel, and then do it two or three times more.

For each channel.

Of which there were sixteen.

Arenya didn’t know what time it was at this point, or how long they’d been at it. Hours, surely. But they’d gotten the process down well enough, and were setting the fourteenth channel by now.

Nearly done with this step, then. Arenya wanted to be excited, and she was, but at that moment all she could really think about was getting a good night’s sleep.

“Just two more channels,” she whispered to herself. “Two more and we’ll be done with this part.”

A knock at the lab door startled Arenya out of her thoughts.

“Oh, Xelax!” Cartalis’ hand shook and released too much mana dust into the pile she was creating. “Zander, what’s the reading?”

Zander glanced at his machine and turned some dials. “Spilled too much in. If we scrape it off now it should be fine, but we’ll need to redo the round.”

Cartalis grumbled to herself as she dusted off the heap of hot steel. “Who would knock to enter this lab? It is open to all students who are qualified. Let us take a break after I finish scraping off this sample and see whom it is.”

Arenya unclenched her fists, put down the expensive tools she was holding, and walked towards the door.

She wasn’t sure who she expected, but not who she saw.

“Drav? Zelzad? Ya’el? What are you doing here?”

Drav couldn’t quite meet Arenya’s eyes. “We were checking in on you,” he whispered.

“Checking in on us why?”

“Uhh… because you missed our meeting?” Zelzad, for her part, all but shouted. “And you missed all your classes today?”

Arenya blinked. “Wait. What time is it?”

“Dinner closed an hour ago.”

“What?” Arenya nearly fell over. “We’ve been in here all day? How did you know where we were?”

“We asked Kazurist.” Ya’el ran a hand through her hair. “He always knows what’s up with you, so we figured he’d know where you were. He was pretty pissed, actually.”

Drav shook his head. “If by pissed, you mean worried, then sure. Worried enough to tell us to go into the graduate lab areas to find out what you were up to the instant we asked. You two never skip class!”

“We were granted an exception,” said Cartalis.

The author's content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

“You were?” asked Zander.

“We were?” asked Arenya.

“No, but my intention was for you two to play along.”

Arenya watched as Zelzad’s breath caught in her throat. “Wait… what is he doing here?”

Zander didn’t turn away from his machine as he tightened one piece while reconnecting a loose wire. “Nice to see you again too, Zelzad. And I’m helping them. What does it look like?”

“Uh, Zander? Your fingertips are bleeding.”

“Screw off, Ya’el.”

Arenya noticed he did seem to be leaving small red smears on the occasional screw.

Evening already… dinner closed…

Arenya dashed to the lounge. “I almost missed the afternoon prayers! Can you two hold without me while I do them?”

“The sample should remain stable for about a week. We can spare five minutes.”

Arenya bolted past scientific implements to the lounge, grabbed her bag, and pulled out her grandmother’s prayer book. Her fingers shook and ached as she turned to the right page. While she normally did the prayers standing, the instant she entered the lab she felt her legs give out as she collapsed onto a chair.

She barely managed to finish the last blessing before the shouting got too loud for her to focus. She looked up to see Drav and Zelzad dragging Cartalis into the room.

“Let me go! We are not in a position to be interrupted!” Despite her words, Cartalis seemed to be letting them carry her. Given her irritation at being touched when she didn’t wish it, and how quickly she would turn her tongue against anyone doing something she didn’t approve of, her attempts to free herself being so weak said a lot. It looked to Arenya as though she was more resisting out of a sense of obligation than any real desire. “You aren’t even permitted to enter these labs!”

“Kazurist gave us an exception tonight,” said Ya’el. “And unlike you, we’re actually telling the truth. Now sit down.”

Cartalis sat in one of the chairs. Zander, for his part, chose to seat himself on the floor.

Arenya barely noticed Zelzad smirking for a split second before her face turned to one of stern neutrality. “How much longer will it take you to finish the metal?” she asked.

“An hour? Maybe two?” said Cartalis. “But mark my words, we shall finish it and we shall do so tonight.”

Zelzad rolled her eyes. “Not before you get some food and an hour of rest, you’re not. Drav, honey?”

Drav opened his bag and brought out three bags. He handed one to Cartalis, one to Arenya, and one to Zander. “You know, your being here does explain why Kazurist told us to bring three meals instead of two.”

Zander shrugged. “I’m a bit surprised he knew I’d joined in. I certainly didn’t make a big deal out of it.”

“Kazurist keeps a close eye on the labs,” said Arenya. “They even check fingerprints. It makes sense he would notice who was in here.”

Drav stared at her blankly. “You wanna say that again but in a way that we can tell what you’re saying?”

Until that moment, Arenya hadn’t realized how she’d been wolfing down her meal out of hunger and exhaustion. She swallowed. “I said that Kazurist pays a lot of attention to who comes in. We learned that the hard way. Right, Carta-”

Cartalis was curled into a ball on her chair, meal untouched. Her breathing was slow and even. On the table a note was placed reading Wake me in a few minutes.

Zelzad massaged her temples with her fingers. “You three are insane, you know that? Why are you working yourselves so hard for this?”

Arenya gulped. “It’s… it’s hard to explain. But I really need to see this done. Cartalis and I have worked so hard to make this project happen, and my family is relying on me to get it finished. If we don’t… they might have to sell the farm.”

Four sets of eyes stared back at her, with expressions ranging from confusion to concern.

“I… I see,” said Drav.

“I’m so sorry,” said Zelzad.

“You coulda asked us for some help,” said Ya’el.

Zander laughed. “Oh, so that’s why Cartalis was so desperate to get my help she offered to make out with me!”

“Dude.” Ya’el threw him a glance that even Cartalis would struggle to match. “What. The actual f-”

“Don’t worry, I told her I didn’t need it.”

Arenya opened her mouth, planning to tell them that that wasn’t even close to all that Cartalis had offered.

The mirth fell of Zander’s face in an instant. “Still, that I pushed ’em far enough that she felt a need to offer that just to get me to listen… Makes a guy wonder, you know?”

Arenya closed her mouth. Now wasn’t the time.

“Well, we almost certainly have a couple months, at least,” she said instead. “We really don’t need to finish the project quite this quickly. It’s just that every day this is looming over my head, I’m worried. Cartalis said we could do this in one day, and so I agreed.”

“Well,” said Zelzad, “Do it in one day if you really want to. But don’t get yourself hurt over it. Your parents wouldn’t want that, right?”

Arenya took a deep breath. “Yeah. You’re right.” She grabbed some more of the food. “I’m so hungry I didn’t even bother to check if this is Follower appropriate…”

“It is. I asked Kazurist for some help.” Ya’el grinned. “See? You are rubbing off on me a little bit. Now maybe once you’ve made your cool sword, I can show you some of my dance moves.”

At that, they all began to laugh. Even a slowly rousing Cartalis.

“Permit us a few minutes more to eat. Then we may continue?”

“You’re asking us for permission?” said Drav. “If it was up to me, you’d be dragged back to your dorms until tomorrow.”

Cartalis gave a weak smile. “Thank you for the obligation to take a few minutes’ rest. It will enable us to complete the final channels more effectively.”

Arenya closed her eyes and leaned back against her chair. Even just being here, silent and enjoying the laughter and casual comments, was enough to revitalize her. She’d just take a few minutes and relax.

The break was over far too soon, but as she stood and stretched and their three visitors said their goodbyes Arenya felt refreshed and ready to continue.

“Two channels left. Ready to kick their asses?” Zander smirked.

“Indeed,” said Cartalis. “Let us continue. Arcane flame.”

Arenya dashed to the lab bench and picked up the tool. “Arcane flame.”