Shadowcast

Night on the Town: Part 1

With a touch more healing magic and a cup of hot miso soup from the shop owner, Liza was back on her feet. The matron was kind enough to give her a blanket to help warm the last bits of biting cold within her. The three walked out into the streets of Little Beilan, lit by a stoic train of luminous orbs that washed out the light of the stars above.

"Since my stuff got ruined," Liza said, clutching a frozen chunk of her beloved shawl, "do you mind if we shop around for some neat Besnior clothes?"

"I also need a staff," Wendy said, "I need my spells to be as strong as possible. I can't let that happen again."

Liza had a hard time keeping track of which bridges and platforms they crossed on their journey, but Wren and Wendy seemed to know the way. It wasn't long before they ran into a girl struggling to fit a set of straps over her chest.

"Need a hand?" asked Liza from beneath her blanket.

"Yeah," said the girl, turning around to face them, "If you don't mind- Liza!"

"Oh, hey, Mako." Liza grabbed the top strap and pulled it over Mako's shoulder. Mako took the other one and wrapped it under her arm. "What's that?"

"I just figured it out," Mako said. She raised her hand, and a metal claw on her shoulder raised to match it. "It's a neural-linked articulating arcane arm!" She crossed her arms and the hand reached out to Liza.

"Nice to meet you," Liza said, shaking the metal claw.

"I was just looking for you."

"Really?"

"I need test subjects for some of my experiments." She took a rod made of metal and wood out of a pouch on her belt and tossed it over her shoulder to Wendy. She fumbled it between her hands before finally catching it. "Press that trigger on the side."

"Okay?" Wendy clicked the trigger in the center of the rod. The rod suddenly extended into a full staff. The sudden shift in weight threw Wendy off balance. "What is this?"

"Do something magic with it!" Mako said, wriggling her hands with excitement.

"O-okay." Wendy traced an emerald green circle on the ground with the end of the staff. The area inside the circle lit up with arcane glyphs and rose up into the air. Her familiar floating disk appeared thicker and more opaque.

"Fascinating." Mako excitedly scratched down some notes on a pad of paper while her third arm held a small wooden contraption close to her mouth. "Sigilspear Log, day two. The collapsible staff can successfully channel arcane energy and seems to have an empowering effect on the subject's spells."

"Do you want this back now?" asked Wendy.

"No, I made it for you," said Mako, "Keep it. Let me know how it works."

Wendy studied the staff. She pressed the trigger again, and the staff collapsed back into its rod form. "Thank you. I don't know what to say."

"Liza, I want you to try this on." Mako threw Liza an overcoat, a plain white blouse, and a pair of dark pants. "Not all of it. Just the coat or the shirt or something. I need to see if this works."

Liza slipped the new coat over her shoulders. "It's a perfect fit," she told Mako, "How did you get it just right?"

Mako affixed her goggles over her eyes and squinted at Liza. "I didn't tailor it. You must have a square figure."

Liza felt like she'd been punched in the face. Wren's laughter kept her from feeling too offended. Mako pulled a knife out of one of her pouches and cut a long gash out of the coat.

"What was that for?" Liza asked. Mako put a finger to Liza's lips and pointed down to the gash. The fibers of the coat wound back together and stitched up the wound, leaving it pristine.

"Edit to log," Mako said into her little wooden recorder, "Self-repairing coat works as intended. I haven't observed any harmful side effects of the mending process yet."

"That's very thoughtful of you, Mako," Liza said, "I like how it matches my shawl."

"I knew you would." She turned to Wren. "Wren, I noticed that you practice your transmutation spells on yourself, which might be dangerous, so I-"

"How did you know that?"

"You were doing it in class today." Mako gave Wren a confused look.0

"But you weren't paying attention," Wren said.

"Not to the lesson," Mako said, "Everyone knows how to fix things with magic. You were doing real transmutation!"

"Huh."

"Anyway, I have this little wood ducky that you can practice on instead of your hand."

"Oh, Mako, you shouldn't have," Wren said with a chuckle.

"I shouldn't? Well if you don't like it, I can make you something else." Mako looked ashamedly at her wooden duck. "Aw beans, I thought I was smarter than this."

"No, no! I was just joking!"

Mako pushed her goggles up onto her forehead. "Oh. Sorry, I'm not great at jokes. Are you sure you want this?"

"Yes, it's great." Wren plucked the wooden duck from Mako's third metal hand and changed it to bronze. "Thank you."

Liza stepped out of the cloud of magical darkness Wendy had conjured to help her change in private. Her new clothes all fit her perfectly. Square figure, she thought to herself, patting her sides, I'm not square. I'm just... evenly proportioned.

Mako bounced up and down upon seeing Liza. "Edit to log: the mending outfit came together better than I ever dreamed! Remind me to add 'costume designer' to my list of potential careers."

"So is this hand wash only, or can I throw it in with the rest of the laundry?"

Mako giddily fixed the coat's collar. "I built it to survive anything short of a disintegration spell! Any cleaning method should work."

Wendy opened her staff again. "You just met us yesterday. How did you make all this so quickly?"

Liza nodded to herself. If her predictions about Mako were correct, she knew exactly how she did it. The two of them were the same, Liza was just more repressed. Their bizarre brains were a pathway to many abilities, some considered to be... unnatural.

"I don't work the way you do. Genny had a word for it, but I can never remember it."

"Genny?" asked Wren.

"My sister. She's a genius!"

Liza looked at Mako, feeling the strange tinkerer's excitement kindle the same joy in herself.

"We're heading to Stormborough to buy some stuff," Liza said, "You want to come with us?"

Mako's eyes lit up. She wiped the machine oil off her cheek and slicked back her frizzy black hair. "I'm always down for a night on the town. Hey, that rhymes!"