And lo, the collection hat was passed around, phones call sent to some of the local farmers. Sure, there was plenty of cash that was given, but more importantly in some respects? Favors. I was not the most social person around, but connections and favors, both official and not, made up the backbone of the rural community. Sure, there was the burning letters in the sky, but all that meant? Well, there were questions, wondering what I needed cows for given how we were going to be in the middle of a zombie outbreak... which honestly was a good question.
Back at the house, my PDF's were being printed off. Hopefully, it would save a few lives as peoples looked it over... and as I reconsidered some of the options of just what Magic Weave would be able to imbue people with, because as it turned out? Oh yeah, the krekeri doing the implanting (that was me) could actually select just what the resulting spell like abilities would be. Dreams of Wall of Stone and Move Earth quickly faded... but there actually was a work around. Hopefully. I did NOT want to give unlimited Limited Wishes, as frankly?
Making a bunch of genies to create defenses sounded like it would backfire down the line. Largely by forcing me to create a graft that can grant Wishes at will which would likely annoy the great and mighty GM's. But, while it would take more work? Wood Shape, Ironwood and Permanency were a combination that took advantage of the fact we had no shortage of trees around the property. But the last? The last had a weight of thirty, fifteen after tying it to a focus. Two instances of Magic Weave. Which was as expensive as the first two combined. But then I remembered a key detail, and ironwood was off the list.
All in all, those plans were scrapped. Sure, it meant that they would have to renew the Ironwood enhancement on the walls every day (longer once they got some levels), but the important thing about the Woodwright graft was that it was more affordable, at thirty graft points. Alas, my dreams of a Solarite Warrior (as it turns out both sunbeam and sunburst were on the fey magic list) would be even more out of reach for the moment. At a weight of twenty six, I would need four instances of Magic Weave to go along with Personal Focus to get solar powered blasters. Or, five feats. Three hundred and ten graft points.
I wept, even as I looked over cheaper alternatives... and as I looked at Farmer Luke (not related to my little brother Luke) and shook his hand. It was one thirty six in the afternoon. It would take me half an hour per cow, or an hour for every two. Sure, after checking things it turned out that Heal could be used for me to look after six patients at once DID apply to those I was grafting. Turns out, the actual procedure, the implanting, might not take that long... but it took an hour to fully stabilize.
An hour I needed to be aware of them and monitoring them, to adjust things on the fly as their bodies warped and changed. All of this mostly a distraction for the panic, and the fact that I could only afford six heads for the simple fact that would eat up an hour, taking me to a bit past four. From there, I pondered as my hand clenched down on a bovine kidney, as the flesh pulped, dried and unraveled all at once, a further ten minutes for every five points used in its construction.
Yeah, Woodwright graft would take an hour. So, four forty to five. The implanting would be finished at either five thirty or six depending on travel times. Which hey, gave me some time. Not a ton, as I heard barfing behind me, as I tore and stripped away ligaments with my hands, as I took out those stomachs and evaporated the bile through means I can only sum up as mythos gamer bullshit. Still, better to plan, as I used snapped off leg bones as spindles for the intestines.
The Flamespitter grafts would be much easier to make. Only two for the mouth feature, five for the spitting augment (fire of course), three instances of sniping mouth at one point each to give some range, two instances of concentrated spit to up the damage for four points and finally three points for spraying mouth to give them some flamethrower ability. Seventeen points total, so forty minutes per graft. Actually, given just how things round up, might as well add one more sniping mouth and one more concentrated spit to make it a total of twenty points. Lucky, that I got a hundred and forty graft points.
Fun times, as I was starting making the Woodwrights graft in the back of a truck on the way back. making sure to wave to Luke... who was rallying those he could, as they planned on getting everything they could under cover. Mostly I had to keep moving the lattice works and energy flows, the abilities that it would contain... and of course, the fact that balancing it, condensing it and packaging it into what amounted to a be a biological ZIP file that would not fly into a mess of metaphor and cancer was an interesting challenge.
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Was not joking about the cancer either. Sure, I would not bother implanting it in anyone if it failed... but yeah. Wildly mutating out of control nature magic. It was a thing.
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Reginald
He watched his son work. His troubled and troublesome eldest. Matt had always danced along the boundaries of bright wild intelligence, at times showing that he could recall strange and minute bits of trivia, snatches of conversations and sparse and isolated details while barely being able to do more than basic math. He was also open to strange ideas, flights of fancy, needed to have someone ride herd on him to get almost anything done in time, was capable of near hibernation and his sense of hygiene was atrocious.
Combined with his temper problems and how he grew increasingly less tolerant of social interactions over the years... with his occasional bouts of hallucinations and strange dreams... on reflection, Matt may have joked about how he viewed his mental state, because to quote him, 'I can either laugh or cry, and laughing pisses them off.' Matt considered himself to be a joke, but therein lay the most annoying thing about his son. Matt was fully at peace with himself.
He was introspective, he asked himself questions, he looked at self help books, channels and even asked people. He saw Matt's library before his wife donated it one summer. While there had indeed been plenty of fiction and fantasy in it, magic and occultism, mythology and legends... there had been a great deal of philosophy as well. But push come to shove? He was man enough, as he watched his son open Bill up, as the round ball of flesh opened and swayed in strange winds, to admit that Matt had always been dangerous.
More obviously so now, bone-metal knives carved apart flesh, as they exposed something primal, something mortal eyes were not meant to see. Something, that in many ways, was more Bill than the flesh that was being used as a bridge, as roots and thorns and spikes drove into his flesh, digging slipping into that wordless part of him at his core. And all the expression on Matt's face was interest, was curiosity as he tapped on the soul of his kin, as something anchored into it and burrowed inside.
But then... Matt had taken this power to be, if not really a doctor, than something close to a healer. To be someone that wanted to help, in that earnest way Matt had. In that clumsy way. Because Matt rarely understood the WHY of whatever it was he was doing, even as he nodded.., and began work on the next tool to help them survive the night, one eye on his 'patient' all the while. It was disturbing as he left, to pick up the tools and to get things ready, cars already shifted.
Matt, at the very least, was going to be working the entire night through. Which meant he was going to be a colossal pain to deal with tomorrow. He was always cranky as hell when he didn't get enough sleep.
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Cathi
On the one hand, even while he was under for an hour, the whole deal with Bill was much easier to deal with when she watched him running his hands along the tree line... and the wood, branches and bark following along like wet clay. Yes, they needed the boys to drag along logs where there were no stretches of trees, well, they were still getting a stout wall and one done quickly. And before the night even falls, thank God. But... she shivered as she heard David testing out the Flame Spitter Graft... or at least, the flaming breath portion.
It was... fortunate that Matthew could provide two of them before eight... even if the last would not be stable, to use his words, before half past ten. It was something to consider, even if... she could not help herself, as she shivered. At the sight of her round and largely harmless cousin/nephew just tear off Davids lower jaw and parts of his throat open before he started to remodel the flesh, adding in small organs, little nodes that glowed and sparked... and changed their host.
Was it something necessary? Sadly, it was so. Would it be enough, as the wall was in place, as there were ramps and cars to reinforce it, that people could walk on and strike at anything trying to get through? She could but hope, hope and pray, as the clocked ticked and tocked.