"Six, you need to very carefully put that down." Weiss said, as she backed away from the table.

"I'm well aware snowflake." I said smoothly, very gently moving the chunk of crystal before me. "Just don't make any sudden moves."

Very gingerly I held the intact Dust crystal in front of me, being careful of its reactivity. It was only a small chunk of one, an inch in diameter and about twice as long at most. The powdered variety was a lot more volatile, as I'd discovered, but that didn't remove the danger. Just because the crystal wasn't as reactive as the powder didn't change the forces that I was still dealing with. If anything, the more solid configuration would exchange a longer reaction time for power. Meaning whatever I used it for would last longer.

I had no idea how powerful or exceptionally volatile Gravity Dust was either. For all I knew, if it went off, it'd be more like a grenade than any of the others. Really, they would've better categorized it as Force than Gravity. But, given it supposedly had an 'attractive' quality when you applied electricity to it, it worked well enough.

The crystal settled into the slug mold, and I immediately set about covering it with epoxy. Greatly lowering the likelihood that it was suddenly going to explode.

"… Ok, I think we're clear." I said "Everybody can stop holding their breath."

I looked to my side, and saw my teammates, sans Ruby and Weiss, and JNPR had all taken several large steps back. Ruby and Weiss had backed away slightly as well, but by comparison to everyone else, I'd say they were still well within the blast radius.

They all might've been, actually. Again, no clue how big the explosion would've been had it happened.

We were in the weapons workshop for another bout of maintenance and Dust related shenanigans. After Port had gotten the reloading bench out of mothballs for me, I'd set about doing some tests. Even if most of what I was doing was well trod ground, experimentation was always a bit fun, if dangerous. I'd tried a different formula for the Ice Dust after the previous rounds had resulted in huge block of ice nailing people. Useful, when applied in specific circumstances, but one note. I tried a different epoxy for the subsequent batch and lowered the Dust content. The round burst and coated most its surroundings in a thin sheet of ice. There was more utility to it, but I was going to keep kicking the idea around until I found something that worked. In the meanwhile, I decided to take a crack at a different type of Dust: Gravity. From the way it'd been explained to me, it behaved more like your standard accelerant when it went off. IE: it unleashed a wave of kinetic energy. It supposedly had some strange attractive quality when an electrical current was passed through it. I knew a lot less about that, but testing would need to wait. I needed to understand the basics of how this stuff worked before I started trying to figure out how to use it to make me fly.

I'd known about the powdered version's exceptional volatility, and had chosen to try and work with the solid crystal instead. Intuition said it would be much more stable to work with.

What I was not aware of however, was that it had a drastically different potency.

Apparently, of all the varieties of Dust I could've chosen to work with, Gravity was one of the most potent. Being used to make things like the airships used by Atlas and Vale be able to hover in the air like they were. One wrong move, and it'd be like having a grenade go off. A literal one, not the figurative ones that most other Dust tended to be.

I'd only really had that explained to me while I was breaking up the crystal for use, of course. Since I was already in danger, I figured the only harm would come about if I didn't see it through.

So, I set the crystals into the molds and left them to cure. I stepped away from the table, ushering everyone back towards our actual worktable.

"… Y'know, I wish you'd said something sooner." I said to Weiss, as calmly as possible "Preferably before I basically pulled the pin out of a grenade and decided not to throw it."

"I didn't know you were going to start immediately trying to work with gravity Dust!" Weiss snipped "It's common sense-"

"Do I really need to say no one explained it to me?" I growled back.

"…" Weiss gave me a pointed look, then clicked her tongue and looked away.

"…Thank you for at least saying something before it exploded though." I added.

Weiss didn't say anything, but I'm almost certain I heard someone whisper "You're welcome."

We settled back down at the table, and everyone slowly got back into the flow of things. Weapons didn't work on themselves after all. I'd begun going over my nightly equipment again. Most of it was in adequate condition. Which meant I had more time for experimenting and such.

"… Hey, Six." Ruby said, looking up as she slid the bolt back into her scyfle "Can I ask you something?"

"Depends." I said, levering the action open on my shotgun "Shoot."

"Why aren't you testing Dust using your other weapons?" She asked "You keep using the same type of shell, and I think it's for that one gun you use, your- um-"

"Flare gun." I supplied.

"Yeah, your flare gun." Ruby nodded "You know how to make your own ammo, which is actually really cool, so why don't you make, like, actual ammo?"

"A fair question." I admitted "The answer is a bit complicated, but you're a gun-nut like me, so you'd probably understand where I'm coming from."

Ruby nodded, and finished reassembling her weapon, before folding it back into its smaller, rectangular storage mode.

"Largely, what I'm trying to do is figure out how I can integrate Dust into the way I fight." I explained "Epoxy works fine if all I'm doing is firing them from my flare gun. It was built to lob projectiles like that. If I tried to do the same thing through a rifle barrel, the round would probably tear itself apart before it left."

"Which would damage the weapon." Ruby said.

"Very much so, yes." I agreed "Secondly, I want to figure out what kinds of effects using Dust can have on my weapons before I move onto the more mechanically complex ones. My aura may allow me to re-enforce my weapons and make them more resistant to wear and tear, but Dust is strange. Gunpowder is purely an accelerant, an explosive of some category. Ergo, my weapons are built to handle those kinds of pressures and tolerances. But Dust having its more bizarre, elemental effects makes it tricky to test. If it's going to do screwy things to my weapons, I want to know."

"Like what?" Ruby asked.

"Well…" I thought about it for a moment, then had an idea "Can I see your weapon for a minute?"

Ruby looked curiously at me. "You want to look at Crescent Rose?"

"It's purpose built to fire Dust rounds, right?" I said "I trust it's well-built, and the frame of reference will help with explaining."

Ruby brightened quite significantly at that. "Sure!" She passed the folded weapon over to me. "There's a release lat-"

I pressed the release and carefully began unfolding the weapon in its rifle configuration, blade still folded underneath the weapon. It was a bolt-action rifle, .50 caliber, somewhere in the range of what the Mojave would consider an Anti-Material rifle. I could see a lot of differences in the design, but I could see enough similarities to make it work.

I thumbed the magazine release, it was unloaded, and held the magazine up for Ruby to see.

"Firstly, the feed system." I said "A minor thing, but given the volatility of Dust, and my inexperience working with it, I'd need to make sure they actually have the force to cycle properly. Or determine if there are any modifications I'd need to make to keep them from detonating. I've had luck with that so far, but it's easier to work in small quantities than large ones."

I set the magazine down, and moved onto the bolt. I twisted it and drew it back, examining it as I went. I removed it from the receiver mechanically, easily. "Another issue is the bolt and receiver. Again, everything is beefed up to handle the explosive energy of gunpowder. But that doesn't mean it's made to handle the heat of a fire-Dust round, or the implied force of a gravity round. What if I load a lightning round into the barrel? Do I need to insulate the barrel to keep static electricity from causing it to detonate in the chamber?"

I set the bolt down and moved back to the rest of the receiver and the barrel. There was a pair of locking pins keeping the receiver in one piece. I removed them easily, and the barrel assembly hinged in half, upward. I pulled the barrel out smoothly, carrying the feed-ramp with it. There was even a small buffer assembly attached to it, which was neat. "Another consideration is what kind of effect the rounds could have on the rifling of the barrel. Again, I pushing insane temperatures and substances against things that were never meant to handle them. Intense fire could easily warp or weaken them, or lightning could reduce them to slag."

Things continued on for some time like this. I basically went through my thoughts with Ruby as I continued to dismantle her weapon in front of her. The lot of it boiled down to how Dust could potentially destroy my weapons in catastrophic ways. But they were things based off of my own observations more than anything. As I continued to learn and experiment, odds were in my favor that I'd find ways to balance it all.

By the time I was done, Ruby's weapon was in a dozen different pieces, meticulously set out before me.

"Frankly that's the just the basics." I said, reaching the end of my spiel. "That's not even getting into material considerations and… um, Ruby?"

Ruby didn't respond, here gaze was down at the table, staring intently and quietly. I tracked her gaze back down to the table.

That was when I realized: I'd completely dismantled Ruby's weapon. Perfectly.

"… Oh- shit, sorry." I said, and immediately began putting it back together "I didn't mean to completely screw up everything you just did."

"N-no, I'm just…" Ruby said, looking completely flummoxed "… H-how did you do that?"

"Do what?" I asked "Breaking down a weapon isn't so hard. Do it enough times you learn how to feel things out."

It honestly came natural after a while. Like I could see the way everything fit together, like a giant puzzle. A giant puzzle meant to kill monsters, but a giant puzzle. You slide the right pieces into place, compress the springs the right way, give it a love-tap or two, and everything came together. I'd chalk the smoothness of it more to Ruby's craftsmanship than my own skill, really.

After a few moments, I had Ruby's weapon reassembled and slid it back to her. The confusion did not leave her however. She picked up her weapon and, standing from the table, cycled it through its various configurations. She did so seamlessly and smoothly.

After she finished, she closed it and set the weapon back on the table. She goggled at it for a moment, before doing the same to me.

"… Is something wrong?" I asked.

"No!" Ruby said, amazed "It's exactly how it's supposed to be!"

"Oh, good." I said "Had me worried for a moment that I bro-"

"How did you do it?" Ruby asked again, excitedly.

I shrugged "Just practice, I guess. I made a habit of dismantling almost every weapon I came across to scavenge for parts. Again, after a while I just got good at it. Speaking of-" I shifted towards Jaune, who was watching the exchange between Ruby and me. They all were, actually.

Jaune had his sword set into a jig, and was trying to sharpen the battered blade with a whetstone. He had more issues he should've been focusing on besides sharpening it, but that was his prerogative, not mine. "Jaune, you might want to try sweeping passes along the length of the blade." I explained "You'll get a more uniform edge that way. Also, keep angle shallow, or you'll undo all your hard work."

"O-ok, thanks." Jaune nodded. His hand bent at the wrist, more conducive to a cutting edge.

I tried to ignore everyone's gaze as I returned to the conversation with Ruby. "Frankly, I could probably dismantle most of you guys' weapons and reassemble them without too much trouble. Might even be able to use most of them given half a chance. But we're kinda sidling away from what we were talking about."

"Y-yeah, just… no one's ever taken Crescent Rose apart completely before, besides me." Ruby said "She's one of a kind."

"I'd believe it." I said, running a hand over the upper receiver, resting it on the scope, which frankly was a bit small for a weapon the size of Crescent Rose, but to each their own. "Last time you let me look at it I was impressed by a lot of what you'd managed to do with it. Having gotten to take it apart now, I could actually see the love and care you put into it. I'm pretty sure I could see my reflection on the bolt."

Ruby flashed me a luminous smile. She liked talking about weapons, being told she'd made a good one probably did good for her self-esteem.

"But like I was saying-" I continued "Those are the kinds of things I'd need to consider when working with Dust in my weapons. Yes, I could probably throw together a rifle or pistol cartridge that uses Dust like I do with my flare-shells. Making one into a shotgun shell would be trivial, I could pump out a dozen of the things for Yang to use, and probably have them be twice the quality of what she already uses."

"I don't know whether to be insulted or interested." Yang says giving me a dry look.

"Why would you be insulted? Ammo's expensive and you work with what you've got." I said "But it's for those same reasons that I'm limiting my Dust experiments to my flare gun for the time being. If it breaks, it'll be easier for me to fix than trying to re-cut the rifling in a new barrel, or re-forge a receiver… Though talking about it now, I should probably give making some 20ga shells a shot. At the very least the damages would be limited."

"You make it sound easy." Weiss said "But if it was, it would be more common for students to learn it, and you wouldn't keep nearly blowing yourself up."

"Easy? No, not by a long shot." I countered, shaking my head "I've just done it enough to know what I'm talking about. It's still dangerous without the right precautions, but working with gunpowder is even more so. Working with Dust is dangerous because of its myriad effects. If gunpowder goes off while you're working with it though… well, they won't be needing a very large box to bury you in, let's just leave it at that."

"I think you're underestimating how dangerous Dust can be in large quantities." Blake commented.

"Oh, probably, but that's just semantics really. Having either of them go off on you will probably end poorly." I said "And just because it sounds simple doesn't change the fact that it can be stupidly dangerous. It's easy to start a fire, with the right tools. It's even easier to set a building on fire if you have no idea what you're doing with those same tools."

"Tell me about it." Nora groused "Nana Bess never forgave what I did to the smoke house."

"… For some reason I'm not surprised you've burned a building down at some point." I said, looking at Nora in a lopsided way "That genuinely just sounds like something you'd do by accident."

Nora's cheeks flushed and she flailed her arms "She said it needed fire, how was I supposed to know she only meant a little bit?" She motioned to Ren, sitting beside her "C'mon Renny, back me up here!"

Ren did no such thing. The most she got out of him was a smirk, a chuckle, and a nudge on the shoulder.

The fact that those three things were enough to get Nora to completely stop spoke volumes. Nora just gave him a big, toothy smile.

The boy knew secrets I would never be able to learn.

"But, even with those dangers I still prefer tinkering with munitions to other work." I said "It's more forgiving than some of the chemistry I have to do to make certain other substances. Or having to make repairs to certain machines and electronics. I love the work, at times, but it can give me such a headache. Especially if I'm working with laser weaponry."

Ruby's eyes immediately lit up. "Really?"

I smirked a little at that. "Absolutely. In order for Energy Weapons to be at their most effective and efficient, you need to make sure all of the components are calibrated properly. Even more so than you would a standard firearm."

Ruby's eyes started to widen. "Are… are we-"

"Yes, we're going to talk about Energy Weapons now." I said "Seems an appropriate time, given the location."

"Yay!" Ruby shouted.

"Oi, voice down, this is a private thing, remember?" I asked, eyeing the students who noticed Ruby's outburst.

She flushed red a little, and tittered a small chuckle. "Sorry, just excited."

"I'm sure you are." I said "So, where do you want me to start? History, construction, maintenance- pick your poison."

"Ooo- Let's start with how they work." Ruby said quickly "Because- um- Yeah, how do they work?"

"Different from over here, I'm sure." I said "Since we don't have Dust, things have to be kept a little more conventional. If you can call Atlas' weird Dust rifles a 'laser rifle'."

"Conventional by your standards, anyway." Weiss sniffed.

I swiped open a section of the table to work on, and set out a piece of paper. I took a pencil and began sketching, visual representations helped, in some case. "Let's start with the basics, you know what a laser is, correct?"

"Um, it's light." Ruby said "But it's focused like a flashlight, right?"

"A crude explanation, but yes." I agreed "Light, in all its forms, is a type of electromagnetic radiation, covering a spectrum that is both ridiculously broad and hilariously small. In the case of lasers, they are a small, specific part of that spectrum. Being specifically amplified and concentrated to achieve various uses. In the interest of not going off on a tangent, I'll avoid talking about them and just focus on their use in weapons." As I said this, I sketched out a basic layout for a laser array, like you'd find in a pistol or rifle. "You've got a couple of key parts that make up an array, that all designs are based on. You need a power source, a capacitor, a wave/particle diverter, various focusing crystals, and some form of housing for all of it." I finished my crude sketch and turned it around towards Ruby, passing the drawing to her.

Ruby took the crude pencil sketch and looked at it with scrutiny. She wasn't awed by it, but was meticulously observing it. Which I took as a sign of great investment. She'd been wanting to hear about Energy Weapons for some time, so making sure she had a held interest was key.

"The power source charges the capacitor; the electricity is in turn transmitted to the diverter. The diverter converts the electricity from the capacitor into a more concentrated portion of the Electro-magnetic spectrum. Which, after being converted, is then diverted into the focusing crystal arrays that make-up the 'barrel' of these weapons. The laser is further focused and concentrated as they pass through the crystals, until they leave the housing altogether in a bolt of, typically red, light."

"You mean a laser." Ruby said.

"Yes." I assented.

"Cool~." Ruby tittered.

"Very." I agreed, motioning to the diagram "While all of those pieces are important, however, the most important one is the diverter. Without it, the weapon won't even function. Which is why it's generally a rare thing to see Energy Weapons around the Wasteland. Aside from the lack of ammo, anyway. Bullets are a lot easier to manufacture."

"So normal guns are better?" Ruby asked "That doesn't make sense."

"It's not a matter of 'better' in this case, Ruby." I explained "Most of your typical firearms are, again, better suited for the wastes. They're sturdy, easily maintainable, ammo is less rare, and unless it has some form of mounted optic on it, I can accidentally drop it and reasonably believe it'll be fine. Y'know, all things that are ideal in a place like the Mojave."

Ruby looked at me in confusion. "They can't be that bad. Otherwise, there wouldn't be any of the still around, right?"

"Well, technically yes. However, most of the stuff that survived to present day were the older models. They were built sturdier, and could survive the harsh conditions they found themselves put into. Most of the 'rifles' you'll find are derived from AER9 model, top of the line would've been the AER12's. The 12's were just too fragile to survive. Though you'll still find some of the more advanced kit if you go scavenging in the right place. But you've got a lot more drawbacks to contend with when working with Energy Weapons. Just take what I said about firearms, invert it, and that's the trouble with energy weaponry. They're finicky at times, parts are scarce and extremely hard to manufacture, ammo can be next to impossible to find, and while the housing is typically strong, if you drop it, you run the risk of causing problems one and two. They were built for combat, but there are times you'd never think that."

"Sounds like you really just don't like them." Weiss said, giving me a narrow look.

"Gee I wonder why." I deadpanned "That's not even counting the day-to-day maintenance. You have to almost routinely open them and check for damages, or even just realign the focusing arrays. If even one of them is out of alignment with the rest of them you lose both efficiency and efficacy. Which tends to happen when you're out in the field."

"You're really just taking all the fun out of this, y'know?" Ruby said, the wind clearly taken out of her sails.

"I just don't have a very high opinion of them." I said "There's plenty of people who swear by them, but I've just never seen the point. They're flashy and cool, but I can achieve comparable results eight-to-ten using conventional weaponry… Still, I will concede that they have their advantages."

Ruby nodded, listening.

"Because they're not reliant on an accelerant or cased ammunition, Energy Weapons are typically recoilless. Barring certain moving parts on specific designs." I explained "Meaning there's less of a need to compensate for that. Additionally, because it's not an actual projectile, and just a directed beam of radiation, their effective range is far greater. Aided further by the fact that the laser itself is literally moving at the speed of light, only leaving an ionized vapor trail behind it. Meaning you don't have to lead your shots either. All things that can lend themselves to certain marksmanship roles."

Ruby's eyes began glittering as I explained some of the weapon's perks rather than just espoused their flaws.

"In terms of damage, lasers aren't exactly lacking either." I continued "While a bullet can have different perforating effects depending on the type of ammo used, lasers tend toward a common mold. Pretty much all of them are guaranteed to burn a fist-sized hole into whatever they hit. The only difference tending to be how deep the burn and what kind of target you hit with it."

"It depends on the power source, right?" Ruby asked "Like, how much energy it can draw from?"

"A good guess, but not entirely correct." I said "The power source is typically treated more like a magazine you'd find on a standard firearm. It's a combination of the capacitor, diverter, and focusing arrays that determine its function as a weapon. The capacitor determines how quickly and how powerful a shot you can produce. The diverter, again, converts that energy into the laser. Then the focusing arrays hone it into the ubiquitous bolt of deadly light."

"Um, speaking for those who don't understand any of this." Jaune said, raising his hand "Why can't you just hook the power straight to the thing that makes the laser?"

"A good question." I acknowledged "The answer is simple: transfer. A power cell can only put out electricity so quickly. Which can lead to unnecessary strain on the whole system, as well as power lost to heat in the process. Instead of running the system directly from the source, you instead use the power source to continually charge the capacitor. Once the capacitor is appropriately charged, the weapon can be fired, and that stored energy can much more quickly be sent through system. Making it much more effective than just running directly off the power source."

Jaune nodded, seeming to understand how I explained it.

"And that's what determines how powerful a laser is, right?" Ruby asked "The capacitor and the diverter."

"Now you're on the right track." I nodded "Energy Weapons come in all shapes and sizes, including rifles and pistols. The rifles tend to be more powerful due to increased size, increased number of components, and similar such things. The tradeoff being they typically fire slower since, again, now there is more strain on the power supply. Which leads to requiring different ammo as well, but that's tangential. Conversely, pistol-style Energy Weapons pack less punch but typically fire faster due to being pared down. Less parts to flow through, less strain, but you pay for it in the damage department."

"What kind of difference does it make?" Ruby asked "If the rifles use more power than the pistols, it has to make a difference, right?"

"Of course, otherwise there wouldn't be much point in the distinction." I agreed "In general, lasers are typically most effective against soft targets. Things like clothes, woods, various paper products-"

"People." Blake said blandly.

"-and some softer styles of body armor." I finished, motioning to Blake "They wouldn't be worth much as weapons if they didn't work so well against organic matter."

Ruby blanched a little at whatever mental image that gave her, but soldiered on. "But what kind of difference do they make?"

"Well, in terms of range they're both comparable." I explained "A laser is a laser, it travels almost indefinitely until it collides with something. However, the increased number of focusing arrays make the rifle more accurate over those extended distances, naturally. In terms of power as well. Both have the power to superficially melt concrete or burn holes through softer targets. But a rifle is more likely to melt through a steel plate than a pistol. The temperatures you're dealing with in your typical laser are, frankly, ludicrous."

"That's hot." Yang said snidely.

"Shut up, Yang." Ruby groused.

"They are, ultimately, effective weapons." I conceded "However, despite their formidability, the drawbacks I mentioned before hamper them immensely. They have other drawbacks as well that derive from their nature of being lasers rather than solid projectiles."

Ignoring that light could exist as both a wave and a particle.

Physics.

"What kind of drawbacks?" Weiss asked, clearly fighting off the glazed-over look everyone else seemed to be getting. "Even if they make for poor handheld weapons, they would still be effective as mounted ones I assume. Most Atlas military vehicles have those types of weapons mounted on them."

"Well for one, they lack the impact of a bullet." I explained "They're literal light, so the kind of force they can inflict on impact is typically negligible. Great if you want to take out a soft target without massive collateral damage, not so great if you're trying to stop something in its tracks. Although I wouldn't be surprised to find that they did make vehicle mounted versions. Frankly I've just never seen any and, again, there were a lot drawbacks. Further compounding it, laser weapons can have difficulty when it comes to armor for similar reasons."

"But you said it can melt steel." Ruby said "How could it not be good against armor?"

"Well, I could tell you." I said "But you're a weapons-nut, you might already know part of the answer if you stopped and thought about it."

Ruby squinted at me pointedly, but focused elsewhere, mulling over the statement.

I drummed my fingers against the table, patiently. Ruby was an odd-ball, but she was knowledgeable when it came to the things she cared about. I got the sense that, even when dealing with things she wasn't entire familiar with, she could intuit more information that she thought.

"… They're not bullets, so it's not about how hard they hit." Ruby said, trying to puzzle it out "But if they're struggling with armor…" Her silver eyes suddenly began to glitter. "If they're used against heat resistant material, they're not as effective."

"You're on the right track." I said with a nod "Most metal armor can be a challenge for a number of reasons. The thickness of it can make it a challenge to begin with, but if its heat diffusion is high enough, it make the laser even less effective. The same holds true if the material is itself insulative, specifically reflective."

Unauthorized use: this story is on Amazon without permission from the author. Report any sightings.

"Like a mirror." Ruby said, eyes still glittering.

"What does that mean?" Yang asked, trying to follow the conversation.

"He's saying that the lasers can be reflected off of shiny objects." Ruby explained "Kind of like how a bullet can ricochet if shot at the right angle."

"Exactly." I said "Couple those factors together and you start to get why lasers may not be as effective as advertised. As long as the armor is either properly insulated, reflective, or capable of withstanding the extreme temperatures, the weapons become almost ineffective at anything. Consider now, that most robots are typically well armored, and that ceramic armor exists."

"So as long as you're properly prepared, lasers go from being really effective, to not." Ruby said succinctly, still mulling "… But you could still get around it, like if you made the laser hotter, or found a way to add more force to it."

"This is also true." I agreed "Those are the alternatives to making a laser more effective. However, then you run into the problems of how to make that happen. How do you make a laser hotter? How do you put more force behind literal light?"

"Um…" Ruby puzzled. She was concentrating so hard, I could almost see steam coming out of her ears. "I… I don't know."

"Don't worry, I wasn't expecting you to have an answer." I said, nodding "Those are the types of questions that the pre-war weapons designers had to answer. Despite my distaste for them, Energy Weapons were, and still are, effective. As long as you know how to use them, and deal with their finicky nature. Like I said before, the AER9 was just the model of laser rifle to survive to the present day. They weren't the top of the line though."

Though I did own one of the few remaining prototypes of the AER14 series. Having seen for myself how effective it was, it showed just how much had been lost in the intervening centuries.

"Is there anything else?" Nora asked, trying to worm her way into the conversation "Like, you keep talking about rifles and pistols, what, did you guys never try and make laser shotguns, or machineguns?"

"No, we did." I said "Though 'shotgun' is a bit of a misnomer, there does exist an energy weapon called a Tri-beam laser rifle. Which basically fills the same role. They cut down the size of it and changed the emitter to fire three lasers at once. Though they're even more temperamental than your standard energy weapon because of the extra strain those emitters add."

"Wait- gatling lasers!" Ruby said, snapping her fingers "You mentioned them too when we talked about… um… y'know, robots."

As Ruby spoke, she seemed to remember we were in public, and shouting was a good way to grab people's attention.

"Yes, gatling lasers are also a thing." I agreed, giving a quick glance around to see if her sudden shout had attracted anyone's undue attention. Aside from some odd looks, no one was really paying us any mind. "They were developed as a way to try and increase the AER laser system into a more powerful weapon. Effectively turning the rifle more into a minigun than a machine gun, but the principle carries."

"How did they do tha- wait, no!" Ruby said, suddenly deciding to try and figure it out herself "… Minigun…" Her face grew confused as she seemed to come to her own conclusion. "Did… did they just take a bunch of laser rifles and strap them to a rotating chassis?"

"… Do I really need to answer that?" I asked.

Ruby gave me a simultaneously appalled and awe-struck look. "That's cool… but it's so stupid!"

"If it's dumb, but works, is it really dumb?" I asked.

"… I mean…" Ruby shrugged "Not really?"

"Then there's your answer." I said "It might seem stupid, but it did the trick. The overall system is less powerful than your standard laser rifle, because they had to shrink the design to make it more manageable. But the trade-off for the inherent power came in that its rate of fire was dramatically improved. If a laser rifle could fire a bolt every second, then a gatling laser dwarfed that, firing eighteen hundred bolts per minute."

Ruby looked at me, thunderstruck. "Eighteen hundred!?"

"Yes, one thousand eight hundred. Which, frankly, makes it slow by minigun standards, but fast by your typical energy weapon's." I said.

"… Cool~" Ruby intoned.

"Yeah, frankly." I agreed "Pretty cool."

"What else you got?" Nora asked "You've got to have something else you're not telling us. I wanna know, buster."

"Oh, I always have something I keep in reserve." I said, smirking at her "It's just a matter of what I feel like telling you."

I should've watched my mouth.

Now Nora's eyes started glittering.

"Oh yeah?" She asked, grinning maniacally "Is that a challenge, Mister?"

"… No, no it's not." I said succinctly.

"Too bad." Nora said "Because now I've got questions."

'Of course she does.'

"… Alright." I said "Hit me."

"If I did that, I might hurt you." Nora said, giving me a toothy grin.

"Funny." I retorted "But, what's your question."

Nora's smile maintained its manic edge, but gained a strange quality to it. One I'd almost describe as 'crafty'. "First, let me present my evidence."

"Evidence?" I asked "What do you need-"

"First!" Nora squawked "You seem to intimately know how these weapons work, both mechanically and in combat. Implying that you've used them in past."

"…" I didn't respond to that. Frankly That one seemed fairly self-evident.

"Second!" Nora squawked, again "You know what happens when they're used against the inappropriate targets, and have implied that there exist multiple kinds of 'Energy Weapons' to work around that."

"…" Again, I kept my mouth shut. This time for fear of implicating myself

"Third!" Nora squawked, again "By your own admission, you enjoy hiding cool things from us!"

"… What's your point?" I asked, not liking where this conversation was leading

Nora gave me a grin I'd expect to see on, say, an animal that thought it'd cornered its prey. She had something she wanted to say, and I think she knew I wasn't going to like what it was.

Then suddenly, the look vanished. Replaced by a vacuous air. Completely devoid of her usual energy.

"Nothing." Nora said, giving me a neutral smile "I just wanted you to know I was paying attention."

"… Ok." I said "But none of that was really a question."

"I know." She said smoothly, soothingly "It was just a test."

"Uh… right." I said, now trying to puzzle out what her angle was. She'd been following a line of reasoning, and I just wasn't sure what it was. Even if she'd suddenly abandoned it, I needed to know why-

"I was just going to ask if you had any guns that shoot lightning." Nora said "Those would count as Energy Weapons, right?"

"You mean Tesla Cannons?" I asked, rhetorically.

My brain immediately locked-up as the words left my mouth. I immediately realized what Nora had just done.

The grin raced back to her face, her usual energy bubbling through it "Ah HA!"

The pieces began to fall into place. Nora paid attention, like she said. I'd kept using the term Energy Weapons throughout me and Ruby's talk. I'd obliquely made reference to there being things made to work around AER systems inherent weaknesses. I'd made it painstakingly clear that I had a very tacit understanding of how these things worked. What I hadn't been willing to admit, was that there existed other Energy Weapons besides lasers. If the conversation was going to start to take that turn, I'd already decided to put it back on track. Because that would be too much information. I'd expected it, I'd been prepared for it.

But she got through anyway.

Because I wasn't expecting it from Nora of all people.

Because I hadn't expected Nora to play the mental equivalent of chess to do it.

Because Nora was Nora. She wasn't… wasn't-

Everyone who wasn't looking at me looked to Nora, looking as confused as I felt. Everyone save for Ren and Ruby. Ren just gave me a knowing, bemused smile.

Ruby, on the other hand, was looking at me with the same bewildered and excited energy she'd had throughout the entire conversation so far. Only now there was an expectant quality to it. She knew I had more to give, and she wanted it.

Nora flashed me a cheeky smile, her eyes glittering with an almost electric pride. She knew exactly what she'd just done, and was proud of it.

"…You wily little brat!" I said, shaking my head and chuckling despite myself "How!?"

"I pay attention." She said proudly, stabbing a thumb at herself. "And now I know how to get the truth out of you, Mister Man."

"If you think it's going to be that eas-" I started.

"You've got guns that shoot lightning?" Ruby suddenly shouted, cutting me off.

"Uh-" I started.

"What others are there!?" Ruby asked, eyes glittering as she began to lean closer from across the table.

"I mean-" I tried to continue.

"How far do they shoot?" She pushed, suddenly halfway across the table "How powerful are they!?"

"Well- it's- uh-"

Suddenly, Ruby was the rest of the way across the table and gripping the collar of my jacket. Her face so close I could make out the glitter of her silver eyes flawlessly. It might've been the angle, but she looked like she was… blushing. "Can you pair them with lasers!?" She asked.

With practiced ease, I ducked down and slipped out of the jacket of my uniform. Stepping back and away from the table. Leaving Ruby laid across it, holding the now limp garment as she tried to understand where I went.

"Alright, that's enough." I said, regaining my composure. "There's a reason why I didn't want to talk about them, and this is a prime example of it."

Ruby blinked, and the glitter vanished from her eyes. She looked down and realized what exactly she'd just been doing, and the blush I thought I'd seen on her cheeks raced over the whole of her head. Immediately, she scrambled backwards and off the table. Our teammates and JNPR looked to be stifling laughter at the display.

Cautiously, I approached the table again. "Yes, there are other Energy Weapons. No, I'm expressly not going to talk with you about them. You're like a dog with a bone about this stuff, and no, I don't mean Zwei." I said succinctly "… Can I please have my jacket back?"

Without looking at me, Ruby blindly tossed the piece of my uniform to me over the table. "S-sorry."

I shrugged back into my jacket, not answering Ruby, but giving Nora the stink-eye. "You see the trouble you cause?"

"Worth it." Nora smirked "'Cause now we all know you've got all kinds of other cool things to talk about."

"You already knew that." I said.

"Yeah, but now I know you've got lightning guns." Nora said.

"Yeah, whatever." I said "How did you figure that one out anyway?"

"I pay attention." Nora admitted with a smile.

"She actually scores a lot higher on Port's tests than people think." Ren admitted.

"And I don't even study!" Nora chirped.

"One of those does not preclude the other." I said dryly.

Nora looked at me, stricken. "Are you kidding!? Have you managed to stay awake through all of Port's classes?"

"Admittedly, no." I said "But I do bare bones studying and get passable grades anyway."

"Well, I don't study, and I'm still passing anyway!" Nora squawked.

Out of the corner of my eye, I swear I could see Professor Port physically cringing. Nora wasn't exactly quiet, and the conversation was becoming increasingly more public.

"Alright, alright, dial it back." I said "You're passing, big whoop. You've got a good memory and a decent idea of how to apply it. There's more to it than just memorizing facts."

"Oh really?" Nora asked, an audacious smirk on her face "How about we make a bet then."

"A bet?" I asked "What kind?"

"Pancakes and Backrubs, what Renny and me do." Nora said "If I win, I get pancakes, I lose, you get a backrub."

"I meant your game, pancake." I said "I'm no stranger to gambling, but you need to actually have something to bet on before you can actually gamble anything."

"Oh, right." Nora said, tongue darting out of her mouth as she made a quick, dopey expression. She rapped herself quickly on the head, and refocused on me. "I'm going to make a guess about you. If I'm right, you owe me pancakes!"

"And if you're wrong, I get a backrub." I added "… Just saying that you're going to be making a guess about me is a bit broad of a game, you'll need to be more specific… given you seem keen on trying to prove your cognitive capabilities, something related would be appropriate."

"Huh?" Nora chirped.

"… Your ability to think." I supplied.

"Oh… duh." Nora intoned, chastising herself.

I mulled the idea over for a moment. It seemed a fairly benign and innocent. "…Your deductive reasoning seems a bit lacking, so why don't we make a gamble on that." I said "Given everything you've heard today, why don't make a guess based off of that?"

"Off of Energy Weapons?" Nora asked.

"Or similar related topics." I said "If you make a correct guess, then we'll count that as your win. If you can't then we'll-"

"You have one with you." Nora said succinctly.

"… Pardon?" I asked.

"You brought an energy- laser- whatever with you when you came here." Nora said, eyes scrunched shut in concentration. "You know that they're good weapons, so you wouldn't leave without one. But you also like to keep secrets and you know how fragile they are, so you've avoided bringing it out. They're hard to repair, so if something goes wrong, you're worried you might not be able to fix it. You also know that Ruby really likes talking about weapons. If she knew you had one, and didn't show her, you'd never hear the end of it."

The whole table stared blankly at Nora for a moment.

Her eyes then opened pointedly towards me, a triumphant smirk on her face. "So… was I close?"

"…" I didn't say anything. We were officially in dangerous territory now. My silence did nothing to reassure any of them.

Then Ruby's eyes started glittering again. "Is… is she right?"

"…" I drummed my fingers on the table as I tried to think of the best way to respond to such an accusation. Was it to just say no? The longer I took to respond that way the less believable it would be. But just outright saying yes would open the door to having Ruby jump at me again. It would also give Nora the satisfaction of having proven her deductive prowess. Which frankly, impressed me, and made me wonder what she could do if she actually tried. Maybe she wasn't a genius, but quick wits mattered. No, my response would need to be something a bit more involved to try and head-off that sort of thing. It would need to be tactful, appropriate, and-

"Fuck you, Nora." I growled, getting up from the table. Eliciting a confused yelp from her.

I stormed my way back across the workshop, towards the locker room. The place was basically deserted which made things easier. But, really, I wasn't sure how many people were going to bother paying attention anyway. I just knew that I didn't want any more people sticking their noses where they didn't belong.

I went to my locker, and opened it. I dug through my weapons until I found what I was looking for. It wasn't so hard, I didn't have many weapons with me that used a drum magazine. It wasn't a real magazine, but it stuck out like a sore thumb anyway.

I pulled the weapon out of my locker, made a token effort to hide it in my jacket, and started back. Of the one or two people I passed on the way, I got a strange look, but not much else. They'd have no clue what I was carrying to begin with, but the less people I had looking at it the better. I crossed the workshop once more at a brisk pace. As I approached our table, I noticed they'd begun murmuring amongst themselves. But I noticed Nora and Ruby were looking straight at me, expectantly.

Without warning, I flipped my Laser RCW out of my jacket. Muzzle swinging to the floor, as my hand glided easily up the stock to the grip.

Ruby and Nora's jaws hit the floor first. My sudden return killing what little conversation had been growing. I believe snowflake's last words were "There's no way he actually has-"

I set down at the work table and put the weapon out in front of me. Making sure everyone had a good look of it.

"This, is a laser RCW." I explained, calmly "Which stands for 'Rapid Capacitor Weapon'." With great care I began disassembling the weapon. "A power source, specifically an Electron Charge Pack, is placed into the center of this drum, which houses a series of capacitors." I disconnected the capacitor bank and held it up from them to see, Recycler still attached. "The capacitors rotate around the power source, and contact the diverter as they cycle through." I set the diverter down, and attended to the diverter and emitter housing, raising them enough to showcase them. "Each capacitor contacts the diverter, generating a laser bolt, before cycling out and being replaced with a charged capacitor. Eliminating the wait-time between shots." I then reassembled at an accelerated pace, making sure everything was put properly back into place. "It's as fragile and finicky as any other laser weapon… but, yes, it's a laser machine gun. Questions?"

Silence, for but a moment more.

Then Ruby gave a peal of delight. "No way, NO WAY!"

"I'm not lying, it's real." I said.

"That's… that's an actual laser gun?" Yang asked.

"Last I checked, yeah." I answered.

"Can I see it?" Ruby asked, looking like she was just barely keeping herself in her seat.

I flipped the weapon over and gently pushed it towards here. As it inched closer, her eyes grew brighter and sharper. As soon as it was within reach she reached out and laid hands on the receiver in a… tender way.

"Gentle." I stressed, allowing her to take the weapon.

Ruby pulled the weapon towards her, eyes greedily devouring the sight before her. "Oh yeah~"

"…" I kept whatever judgments I had to myself. This was probably therapeutic for her. I was most certainly not going to poke fun-

"You're drooling, Ruby." I said flatly.

"Huh-wha- no'm not." Ruby said, dazedly, not taking her eyes off the RCW as she wiped at her mouth.

"The design was made to mimic a popular model of smg from back before the war." I explained "That button at the back of the receiver will help you disassemble it. Remember: gentle."

"Gentle." Ruby whispered, entranced.

Following my instruction, Ruby began disassembling the weapon. Visibly trying hard not to force anything. There were some parts that required a little… persuasion, naturally, but she was good to her word. She took every part off as though they were made of porcelain rather than polymer and steel.

She respected the weapon as much as she was fascinated by it.

Frankly, I cherished the look on her face. Not every day you got to see that level of pure wonder in someone's eyes.

"*Ahem*" Nora said, making it sound like she was clearing her throat.

I let my gaze drift over to her, and found she was giving me just the biggest shit-eating grin.

"You owe me pancakes now, Mister." She chirped, not losing her smile

"Big whoop." I said, slightly annoyed.

"You've had something like this the entire time you've been here-" Weiss spoke, bewilderment alight in her expression "- and it's never occurred to you to use it?"

"Why would it?" I asked "If I don't have a preference for them and know they're a pain to use, why would I make more work for myself later?"

Weiss scrutinized me, but said nothing. Just letting her face scrunch-up in irritated fashion.

"You're just upset because you didn't realize it first." Nora chirped triumphantly.

Weiss looked at Nora with unmasked irritation and, frankly, embarrassment.

That it was Nora who said probably didn't help.

But, she also helped me discover that snowflakes could turn red. Which was at least a chuckle-worthy discovery.

"I have so many questions." Ruby said numbly, staring at the disassembled and gutted weapon in front of her.

"I'm sure you do." I said, looking down to my pip-boy and checking the time. My flareshells were probably getting close to cured now, meaning I needed to go finalize and test them…

"Hey, Tiny." I said.

"Hm?" Ruby mumbled groggily, looking towards me.

"You wanna shoot it?"

…

"-AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA-"

As Ruby screamed her head off, she held down the trigger of the RCW. Causing the gun to begin sweeping sideways from the drum's centrifugal force twisted the weapon slightly. Energy Weapons basically lacked recoil, but moving parts could still impart a different kind of motion.

She was able to easily manage it though, and kept the weapon more or less on target. Which in this case was a metallic silhouette of a Beowulf, if my shapes were right.

After burning about fifteen shots learning to handle it, Ruby got her grip on the RCW and kept it on target. Tracking the weapon back across the distant silhouette, before concentrating fire in the region of its head. A trained Laser Commander could keep concentrated fire over a couple hundred yards out. Ruby was firing much closer than that, with a weapon she was unfamiliar with, but still scoring decently. She made regular use of Crescent Rose as a rifle, so she had to have at least some practice with it. Being able to shoot something with basically no recoil was itself usually a treat with laser weaponry. One I could tell she was fully enjoying.

Because of the attached recycler, the RCW's sixty shot capacity jumped to seventy-five. Ruby had burned through the first fifteen already, but made the rest of them count. After adjusting for the unexpected motion of the drum, she kept herself on target as she burned through the rest of the ECP's charge.

Screaming the entire time.

As the lasers flew down range, they stayed concentrated in relatively the same location on the silhouette. The heat built up quickly, given the small area they were impacting. About the time she'd burned through two-thirds of the ammo, I noticed the steel was starting to glow a warm orange. By the time she'd finished, it was maybe a few degrees shy of molten. I could make out little motes of sparking carbon bursting off of the surface of the metal. Ringed by the rainbow of temper colors that appeared around heated steel. Had she managed to keep the entire cell on target, she probably would've turned the silhouette to slag.

With the cell drained, the capacitors whirred to a stop. Ruby stopped screaming, and stared aghast at the still glowing steel as it began to cool. She then held the RCW out in front of herself. Eyes roaming over it, sparkling like silvery jewels.

She then clasped the weapon to her chest. Another peal of utter ecstasy escaping her as she cuddle the weapon as though it were a teddy bear.

"I love it!" Ruby cried, giving me a brilliant smile.

"I can see that." I said, looking between her and her former target "I'd say you picked up on how to use it pretty quick too."

I spared a glance back to our teammates and JNPR. All of whom were either looking at the display of firepower completely dumbfounded or in some degree of bewilderment.

"What's the matter?" I asked "Blake steal your tongues or something?"

Blake responded to that by giving me a very catty look.

"… Oh my god you're actually an alien with a laser gun." Yang said, looking at me like I'd sprouted another head.

"What of it?" I asked "You've known that for a couple of weeks now."

"It's different seeing it." Blake stressed, squinting off into the distance at the nearly-slagged target.

"And you had trouble with me understanding the concept of Faunus." I groused.

The look of bewilderment on Yang's face morphed into one of playfulness. "I guess that just means you're out of this world then."

"I-" I started then paused, thinking "… I can't tell whether or not that's a pun."

Yang smirked at me, eyes twinkling. "I know."

"… Whatever." I said, turning back to Ruby. "You gonna keep fondling my gun, or can I have it back?"

Ruby blinked, seeming to realize she was doing her cuddling in public, at relaxed back to a low ready. A faint flush to her cheeks. "S-so how do you reload it?" She mustered.

"The charge-pack is at the front of the drum." I explained, motioning "Push it in, twist, and pull out."

Ruby followed my instructions, and removed the spent charge-pack. She stumbled for a moment on which way to twist it, but got it out all the same. She held the cell in her hand rotating it and examining it. I had yet to see any ammo like it on remnant. Given that it was literally just a type of battery though, it wasn't outside the realm of possibility it existed somewhere. Likely using Lightning Dust as a fuel source rather than lead-acid or nuclear material.

After marveling at the ECP for a moment, Ruby passed both it and the RCW back to me. I gave them a quick once over to ensure everything was still in proper order, then set the weapon down.

"I should have enough ammo, if anyone else wants to give it a whirl?"

"Ooh, me, me!" Nora squawked, bounding towards me.

I stiff armed her as she tried to reach for the weapon. "Slow your roll there, pancake." I said "Before I top this thing off, I need to make use of the range."

"Then why did you ask?" Nora squawked, stepping back in disappointment.

"Because I enjoy screwing with you, obviously." I said, reaching for my recently made flareshells. "I need to get an idea of what these things can do still."

"Oh… right." Nora chirped.

She, and everyone save Ruby proceeded to take several steps back. I looked to her in confusion. "You sure you want to be standing this close?"

"Why not?" She asked "You're going to be standing next to it, there's no way it'll be that bad, right?"

"… Ruby, did you forget what happened the last time I tried experimenting like this?" I asked.

"Nope." Ruby said, planting her feet.

"… Your funeral." I said, chuckling.

I drew my flare gun and snapped it open. I carefully slid one of my experimental 'gravity' shells into the chamber, then closed it. If this thing was going to catastrophically fail, it'd happen now. I cocked the hammer back, and took aim for the same target Ruby had been hammering on. The steel had almost cooled down, leaving behind a mottled gray.

"Going hot." I said "In three, two, one…"

I pulled the trigger, and the round went off.

A ball of faintly purple light leapt from the muzzle. Sailing through the air lazily, more slowly than my usual flare rounds. Likely a weak charge behind it. It was moving even slower than a plasma bolt. Curiously though, it didn't drop. It continued to sail forward on an almost straight trajectory. Unaffected by the simple things, like the wind or physics. Watching it sail, I chalked it up to the strange effects of Gravity Dust.

The faintly purple mote of light sailed through the air until it collided the distant silhouette. At which point, it stopped moving forward, but stayed in the air. Its purple glow began to deepen and darken.

With a creak of rent steel, the silhouette tore off of its moorings, crumpling around the ball of glowing light. The now steel-clad Dust projectile continued to push forward. Sailing listlessly to the concrete wall at the far end of the range. It collided with it yet again, and began to glow again. A second passed.

Then it exploded.

With the concussive *Thoom* of a mortar round, the flare round exploded in a cascade of purple light, sending a shockwave back our direction. It connected with myself and Ruby and, frankly, wasn't much worse than a stiff breeze. Though I felt it try to rip my jacket off, and it blew Ruby's hair back.

As the cascade of light faded however, I saw we got the lighter end of things.

Where the silhouette had been pinned against the wall, was now a hole in the rough shape of it. Leaving a clear view of the grounds on the other side. I could faintly see the silhouette lodged into a tree. Edge first.

"Whoa~" Ruby said.

"Um, yeah." I nodded, looking down at my flare gun "Whoa."