Collide Gamer

Chapter 53 – The Mechanic and the Sniper

“See ya in a minute.” Rave sashayed away from her boyfriend. He hated to see her leave but he loved to watch her go. With one final wink, his bubble butted girlfriend vanished up the stairs.

John left when she was out of view, ready to find that shed in the back. He had never really explored around the property, courtesy of how short his average stay here was. Following the wooden walls of the old building to the back, he did eventually come across an extension of sheet metal. Through a crooked door, he stepped into a tiny room that had only two things inside it. A staircase leading down and an arcane fuse box.

Arcane, in this case, was the proper word. Runes were carved into the metal and surrounding wood, glowing softly with blue and purple. The cables inside the box were equally material and immaterial, the latter just starting somewhere in the air, gradually turning solid, until reaching where they were slotted into the mechanisms. Observe let John know he had finally found the answer to how this place had electricity, water, and internet.

‘Not sure how a fuse box supplies running water but… I guess that’s just magic,’ he thought and stepped away. He didn’t want to touch it and accidentally cause an explosion or for the plumbing to fail. He didn’t need Travolta bending him like a pretzel.

John went down the stairs and reached a crude wooden door. It was more a rectangle of pressed wood than a real door. Behind, he heard two voices, one male and one female. The Gamer knew he should be the last person surprised that Jimmie managed to attract the attention of a girl, but he still was. Carefully, he opened the door. “Hello?”

Jimmie, he expected. The cap-wearing, brown haired mechanic looked as typical as ever, in his oil stained pants and with his redneck tan. The black haired, leather jacket wearing woman next to him was unexpected twice over. Jimmie and Victoria turned their heads. “Oh, hey John!” the mechanic greeted with unusual enthusiasm.

“Hello, Gamer,” Victoria added, coolly.

The two stood next to each other and they did paint an oddly fitting picture, in a way. The mechanic and the rocker chick was certainly a pairing that was more expected than not. That being said, next to each other was as close as it seemed to be. If there was anything romantic going on, body language did not betray it. A greedy part of John told him that meant he still had the chance to deflower Victoria. He chased that away, he was a happy man as it stood. Instead, he looked around the workshop.

It was larger than he would have thought. The concrete hall was dull when it came to decorations. A poster of a hot woman holding power tools had been taped to the wall here or there. Otherwise, only the manifold shapes of metal being bent into wanted shapes or torn into scrap filled the room. A conspicuous metal hatch was at the feet of Jimmie and Victoria – a rectangle long and wide enough to serve as a grave, had it been an open space.

“Come closer, I wanted to show this to you too,” Jimmie urged him and knelt down next to the hatch.

“Show what to me?” John asked.

“My suit!” Jimmie declared, opening some kind of console in the floor.

“Are you going to prom or…?” John started, only to be interrupted by the rattling of metal.

The hatch began to rise from the floor, revealing itself to be more of a casket. Aside from the welded sides and the hinges at the top, it was smooth steel all around. Once it had reached a metre in elevation, the top of the casket opened. The halves of the top smoothly glided to the side, revealing a suit of armour. No, less armour and more a man of metal, designed to tightly envelop whoever was wearing it. Little arcane bits and wires were visible all over the place.

“You are building an Iron Man suit?!” John marvelled. Utilitarian and unpainted as the design was at the moment, he still recognized the resemblance to the superhero.

“Yeah!” Jimmie exclaimed.

While John nerded out and Jimmie boasted, Victoria remained stoic. “Does that even work?”

“Only a bit…” Jimmie admitted in a small voice. With a few skilled twists and turns, he decoupled a gauntlet from the elbow. “I don’t really have the materials to make it as impressive as I want.” After putting the gauntlet on, he pointed his palm at a nearby piece of wood.

Buzzing and faint light emitted from the steel gauntlet. A hole in the palm concentrated the energy. It shot out and burned a pitiful hole into the surface of a wooden test log. “Eeeehhh…” John couldn’t help but comment with his disappointed reaction. That was even less powerful than a Mana Power Attack.

“Screw you, man!” Jimmie was right back to his usual tone. “Not all of us are Latebloomers that can just learn how to make Artificial Spirits in a week!”

“Could you not?” John requested, as harshly as he could muster, while glancing over to Victoria. He had been keeping Aclysia under wraps so far and he wanted to keep it that way.

“Don’t mind me, I will find out in due time anyway,” the gunwoman stated. “I joined your little club.”

“You did?” John was a tad surprised. “Well, that explains why you’re even here but… I thought you didn’t want to be associated with the Bloodfallen?”

“I said I don’t want to get on their bad side. Joining one of their subordinates is getting on their good side,” Victoria retorted. After a long delay, she added. “I hope.”

“Jooooooohn!” A shout followed by the sound of two feet hitting the ground. The Gamer turned around to see his girlfriend recovering from the jump down the stairs. “Whadareya taking so long for? Oh, hey!” The techno lover, today wearing a light blue shirt and equally blue yoga pants, noticed Victoria immediately. “And you would be…?”

“Victoria Beloozero, I joined today.”

“Did ya? Neat. They call me Rave. Okay, Jimmie and you call me Rave.” She shrugged the entire situation off immediately and walked her way over to John. Only after taking his arm, did she give Victoria a proper scan. “With that outfit, we’re doomed to be mortal enemies. Ya know, metal vs techno, the eternal rivalry.

Victoria wrinkled her forehead. Jimmie groaned. “Rave, it’s really impressive how much nonsense can come out of a mouth that pretty.”

“It’s really impressive how little your robot can do even now. Lemme guess, everyone was like ‘wow’ until they realized it packs less of a punch than my pinkie?” That was an accurate summation, John had indeed seen her fire more impressive lasers with her little finger.

“Hey, it might not be powerful yet, but it’s still arcano-tech!”

“Whatevs,” Rave waved off.

Victoria, however, seemed very interested. “This is arcano-tech? I heard that that takes a lot of skill to handle.”

Adjusting his cap with a bashful grin, Jimmie nodded. “Does indeed – one small mistake and BOOM!” he made a dramatic motion. “Whole workshop explodes.”

“And only the workshop,” Rave whispered to John. “Building was reinforced when Travy moved in.”

John let out a little sigh of relief. He had just started to wonder if he was hanging out above a bomb each time he visited this building.

“Gimme a bit more credit here,” Jimmie demanded, flailing about with the hand in the gauntlet. “I’ve been working on this thing for years now and no mishaps. I’m still in one piece and so is everyone else.”

“Alright, Jimmie, I give ya that you’re pretty good at the whole arcano-tech thingy,” Rave said drily. Every word made Jimmie push out his chest a little further. “Ya can stroke your ego with those words. Try to enjoy it, since ya got no girl who strokes your dick for ya.”

Jimmie opened his mouth and closed it, “For heaven’s sake, Rave, will you let me have anything? Just the tiniest crumb of victory?”

“Ya are still better than me in Smash Bros.”

“Not worth that much!”

“Neither is your robot, yet here you are.”

“Enough!” Victoria intervened while massaging her temples. “Do these two always bicker like this?”

“You get used to it.” John told her. He still hadn’t worked out exactly why Rave was this mean to the mechanic, but their relationship didn’t seem to suffer for it. “Now that I have a moment of silence, Jimmie, can I borrow some clothes from you? I want to go farm some stuff.”

Jimmie smirked at him, only now noticing his get-up. “Skipping school, huh? Yeah, take some stuff but you owe me!” He guided John to a corner where a bed and a closet stood around. They had been there for so long, they had assumed the same aesthetic as the rest of the workshop.

“I sure do,” John agreed. “Thanks for all the metal again.”

“No problem, how big is she now by the way?”

“Aclysia reached over two metres yesterday.” Rave reported. “It was fun.”

“We found out she could shrink afterwards. She’s in my inventory right now.” John elaborated as he checked the contents of the closet. To save inventory slots, he had the Artificial Spirit reduce her size further after he had gotten home.

John took a normal black shirt and jeans which fit well enough. Using his inventory, he just swapped his current clothes with the new ones. No need to find a space to change, one set of clothes was simply replaced with another.

“Alright, show me!” Jimmie rubbed his hands together in anticipation, once the Gamer was back with the group. The Iron Man suit was sinking back into the floor at the same time. All eyes were on John and he hesitated for a moment.

‘Well, she already heard and she’s part of the guild now,’ John thought, with regards to Victoria, then pulled Aclysia from his inventory.

As per usual, the Artificial Spirit took a few moments to readjust to being in this realm. Her eyes were wide at first, her body stiff. Then she took a deep breath in and stood up. Breathing was something she did since she had gained vocal cords and it helped a lot in making her seem human. Currently she was at knee height, so no one would take her for one at that size.

“Hey, can you become big again?” John requested.

“Yes, Creator John,” Aclysia answered. Over the course of five minutes, much less time than yesterday and yet still a notable amount, she grew until she was slightly taller than John. “This is the height I was allocated yesterday. Is this satisfactory or do you wish me to…”

“No, no, this is fine,” John said.

“…to go to my maximum size, Creator John?” She finished the original sentence, despite the interruption. “I will remain like this then.”

‘Really odd to see these little showcases of lacking Intellect and Wisdom,’ John thought. ‘Maybe she can’t comprehend a proper action reaction pattern yet? Or is it her lack of social experience? Perhaps both?’ “I guess I should raise your Stats while I already have you out,” John said. Since he wasn’t keeping secrets, he felt like showing off. Both Jimmie and Victoria followed the scene with keen interest.