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Pokémon League
Professor of Botany
Any trainer that can't afford medicine can come to me. |
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PLAYED BY OOC NAME
PLAYED BY Jayspurr
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Post by Luke Indigo on Nov 9, 2017 17:15:37 GMT -8
Mission name: These Careful Hands Participants: Luke Indigo Spawning?: 4 Obstacles to perfecting the Ultra Aura / Ultra-Wormhole detector. Suggestions would be manipulating a laser machine to etch out the correct circuit board or as simple as operating fine screw drivers and inserting gears into the correct order in the detector itself. Each obstacle should have something Luke could back up and practice comparable but easier tasks in (such as controlling a joy stick may help with the laser machine or putting the screws and pieces together of a clock rather than the machine initially). ~850-1000 words each. Mission details: Now that he has the funding and the resources to work on the Ultra Aura detector, Luke is putting his dexterity skill to the test. The machine’s parts are incredibly tiny and precise and require extremely fine motor skills in order to get just right. Over a couple weeks of trial and errors, Luke will gain Mastery over Dexterity in order to also complete the machine. New Skill: Dexterity (Master) – Luke’s Dexterity has been pushed to the absolute limits in terms of dealing with small and microscopic tasks. His subtle, controlled motions and slim precise hands allow him to weave in and out of tasks that would have others tripping up. During moments of deep zen-like concentration, he can build some complex technical machinery. Note, his dexterity is mostly in the short range. While he can do some long range things like possibly even juggling if he tries, it’s not as practiced. Also ICly Luke will finish the Ultra Aura detector for in character use.
The soft hum of luminescent white lights were white noise against the subtle clicking of metal on metal that reverberated louder in the lab space. A wall clock, whose hands read two thirty A.M., ticked almost in tune with the click and clack as gears were pushed together over and over again.
Luke’s upper teeth grated his lower lip as he hunched over the lab workspace. One hand was on a large metal plate with interlocking components, the other was on a flat head screw driver that was starting to shake ever so slightly from the force of his grip. Beads of sweat had started to trickle down the side of Luke’s face, but he ignored them. If anything, the Nihilego would get them once it realized he needed it away from his vision.
Are you ok? The Nihilego had asked this almost every hour on the hour since he’d started working.
A sharp crack of metal slipping passed metal echoed before a spring jolted form the machine. “FUCK,” Luke barked dropping the screw driver on the table. It twanged hard on the black top surface and started to roll, threatening to fall off the table completely. Luke seized it before he could and smacked it down hard on the counter again. “Are you kidding me?” he snapped, his hand forming a fist and coming down hard on the table.
The Nihilego swayed a mixture of distress and concern in its form on Luke’s hair. I am sorry? It tried using two tentacles of hair to pat his shoulder about as empathetically as a tentacle monster could.
A groan broke from Luke as he exhaled weakly. “It’s fine… it’s fine…. I should… probably go to bed for now…” He mumbled reaching up to rub his eye— or rather Nihilego’s eye— very briefly. “I’ll get it in the morning, I promise…”
The Nihilego swayed. Ok… It answered weakly back. Muttering to himself, Luke put the box away for now, locking it up under the cabinets, before ascending the stairs back to his loft. One of these days, whenever the building was done at AZOTH, he wouldn’t have such a luxury, probably. Maybe. Who knew. He was tired.
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Staff
PLAYED BY OOC NAME
PLAYED BY 🌸 SG 🌸
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Post by Super Gmagical on Nov 10, 2017 2:15:33 GMT -8
Luke wakes up to find that a huge batch of coding which was functioning perfectly last night is now on the fritz for no discernible reason. This program is vital for analysis to let him know what work needs done on the machine, so he must carefully scan the coding and ensure all his revisions are precise to get it working again.
850 Words
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Pokémon League
Professor of Botany
Any trainer that can't afford medicine can come to me. |
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PLAYED BY OOC NAME
PLAYED BY Jayspurr
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Post by Luke Indigo on Nov 10, 2017 10:09:59 GMT -8
Despite the stress and strain, Luke slept well that night. Nihilego fumbled around a little adding pressure and extra layering of its glassy goo to different parts on his skin to position him in the best possible way, and he was exhausted enough that that little gesture lulled him comfortably to sleep. When morning came (or rather his alarm clock burst into song), he felt vaguely refreshed enough to get up out of bed and head to the kitchen. He ate, got dressed, put himself together, and went downstairs to the lab.
The assistants woudn’t be in until at least nine, so he had a few more hours to work on the Ultra Aura detector before they came in and took up his time. Deciding to leave the mechanics of it alone for a while (because if he saw it again too soon he’d want to stab it), Luke went to the computer instead to go over the codes again. With Dad’s help, the programming portions hadn’t been near as strenuous or tedious as it could have been. Though Dad had suggested writing it all himself, Luke had insisted that he needed to be able to learn it and test it and therefore spent quite a bit of time messing with the scaffolding that was prepared for him. He’d gotten a good chunk of it working last night, and maybe just maybe he needed to pat himself on the back for it for a few seconds before getting back to the hard stuff—
Wait what the fuck? Luke squinted at the screen watching it glitch and shift before turning the display upside down??? What was it doing? Why was it doing this? It was fine last night??? Maybe he executed the wrong part of it? Checking the steps and running it again, he got… an entirely different error? Now it was forming the circle image display like it was supposed to, but everything after that was messed up? Changing screens, he ran a diagnostic on it but the poor computer couldn’t find anything wrong. “WhaT,” Luke whispered irritated before running it a third time. At least the first error came back rather than a third but what the heck did that mean?
Pulling back to the text editor, he squinted looking at the top headings and then slowly scrolling through his lines of work. I… really should have annotated this. The thought came too late, and Luke groaned. He remembered what most of this did, however, and hopefully that would be enough to— Were there supposed to be three semi-colons right there? Uhmmmm he was pretty sure? Trying to remove it and running it again, he crashed the computer instead. Oops, yep, that closed a loop. Right, right. So that wasn’t the problem. But then what was? Ugh.
He worked on it up until one of the assistants, a shy but earnest young man named Stewart, came in for the day. Changing his focus and directive to ensure that his berry project and subsequent experiments were going alright, Luke found himself distracted by one thing after another for the entire morning. During the lunch hour, he packed a bento and ate it while furiously scanning over the codes again. Several programming codebooks would be fished out and referenced, double checked, and assured. He’d run the compiler and test the program ten times before lunch was up and still couldn’t find what was wrong. He did learn in that short span that he was apparently very good at making loops and second-guessing them. That didn’t very much help, however.
The afternoon was spent going between helping the assistants and occasionally glancing over code. When they had finally packed up and left for the day, he focused more on the code alone. Nihilego swayed quite a bit, rather distressed to see him so stressed. While it knew something of this strange language Luke was using, it only knew about as much as him and could only give the most fleeting of suggestions as to where the bug lay. Luke was at least somewhat grateful to it and spent some of the time using it as sort of a rubber duck decoder since he didn’t have one of those—…. He needed one of those, didn’t he? He ordered one off EBayleef rather quickly before going back to work again.
It was four A.M., and Luke had fixed three bugs— two of which he had created himself while fixing bugs. The sole other bug he could find was in a nonsensical portion that he had been messing with but hadn’t thought mattered when he ran it— and that still didn’t seem to fix the issue? A fist slammed on the table, and the Nihilego swayed distressed again. Ugh, ok, right, right he’d go to bed for now and try again tomorrow.
…Unfortunately ‘tomorrow’ came in two hours.
He was groggy even with what little sleep he could get and what the Nihilego did to try and help in its own way. He was tired, frustrated, and spent most of the day snapping at the lab asssistants rather than work on the code or even look at the UA detector. By that night, however, he was once more trying to figure out where the hell the issue was. Scanning through the codes with as much effort as he could, he did manage to find one problem and ---
AND???
Was that it? Was this it? Luke blinked hard, so grateful and tired. It was midnight, and he was going to bed at a reasonable hour. Thank Arceus. The Nihilego was thankful as well at this point.
Words: 943
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Post by SGYUMI on Nov 10, 2017 15:47:48 GMT -8
Luke wants to finish his machine, but Nihilego's more indulgent personality wants something else. Perhaps they senses Luke's mild hunger and amplifies it, maybe they amplify a need to go the bathroom, or just generally to take a brake. Whatever the case Luke needs to maintain focus, and keep his hands still as he works on a very vital piece of the machinery. 900 words
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Pokémon League
Professor of Botany
Any trainer that can't afford medicine can come to me. |
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PLAYED BY OOC NAME
PLAYED BY Jayspurr
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Post by Luke Indigo on Nov 12, 2017 6:11:49 GMT -8
That very night as Luke lay in bed cradled by the Nihilego, the latter contemplated deeply. It didn’t need as much rest as Luke did nor did it require immense sustenance in the way Luke did. It did not need to do many things he did, but when he did not have these things, these necessary things, bad things happened.
When he was tired, he made mistakes. When he was hungry, he was slower. When he was stressed, he broke things. These were not Luke’s fault but a limit of his human body. It knew this, understood this, accepted this. But it did not want to see him suffer anymore. Not for it, not for others. Jazz’s feelings remained. Luke was special. Luke must be protected.
A tendril of hair reached upwards and slowly grasped the alarm clock on Luke’s nightstand. Pressing the button to turn it off, it folded back again, setting itself on his cheek. Rest well, Luke it willed quietly to him in his dream land. Rest well.
It would be the sun touching his face that ultimately roused Luke Indigo. It had been many years since he’d felt it just as his eye opened up. Blinking slowly as he came to, Luke stretched. Wow he felt.. so rested.. He felt… so calm and collected. This was rather nice. Good morning… the Nihilego prompted in their shared mind-space.
Luke yawned and ran his fingers through his hair. “Mmmmmmorning…” Luke rolled to one side and then stood up off the bed. Wow, even after fusing with the Nihilego, he felt … pretty light. Had the Nihilego made the bed extra comfortable or something last night—
Luke stared at the clock ticking on above the bathroom sink. “TEN O’CLOCK?” What? What??? Scrambling back towards his closet, Luke was fishing and flailing for clothes. “How could I have overslept? How did the assistant’s ph—“ Running back towards the nightstand, he fished up his phone to find several messages asking him where he was and if they could do x, y, z. “Shoot no I must not have turned – Ugh…” Trampling back over to the kitchen, he fished out a piece of bread, threw it in the toaster, waited maybe a couple of seconds before popping it of his own accord, and taking a bite out of it.
Luke slow down the Nihilego whined. You have time in the day.
“Not really? I’ve lost almost five hours!” Luke snapped scrambling to pull on a lab coat and start down the stairs. “I can’t believe I forgot to set my alarm. I – Nil, why didn’t you remind me?” The Nihilego swayed causing Luke to stop short. “Nil you… what did you do?” The Nihilego swayed again.
Your body is tired. You need to sleep. It whined.
Luke grit his teeth. “That’s— I can handle a bit of exhaustion. You can’t just make that decision for me.”
But Luke…
“But nothing. I can’t get those hours back!” Stumbling down the stairs, Luke came into the lab where two of the trainees stood.
“Uh- hi sir, we found the lab key!” one smiled. Luke tried to smile back and gave a small nod. At least he hadn’t slowed their projects down or anything of the like. Thereafter, he spent some focused time with the students and went about his day. Several of the meetings he’d scheduled had to be canceled or moved, and he had to shuffle some things around, but at the very least, he could spend the afternoon up in the garden trimming and pruning his plants.
…Except until about noon when hunger came.
You need to eat. Nihilego whined. Luke ignored it. Nihilego whined again. When he ignored it yet again, it reverberated in his stomach as an actual growl. He was hungry, didn’t he hear his own body?! Luke winced clutching his stomach. M-maybe a snack then. He ate, and it was happy. He went back to work, but then it was sad. That was not nearly enough food! He ate a bit more, and it complained a bit more. “Nil, stop— I’m fine. I can tell when I’m hungry. I swear.”
When had it gotten so… emotional?
After the gardens had been taken care of, Luke returned to the lab for the evening. Now was time again to work on the detector again. Grabbing up a screw driver— he suddenly found his hand frozen. You’re tired again. Take a break before continuing. Nil- no. He was fine. He could at least start to screw something together? It resisted, pulling against his arm, but Luke moved anyways. He worked for a bit, and the Nihilego writhed some. Deep in their shared neural circuitries, it pushed, willing him to be more indulgent than usual. Just take a break, just take a nap, just—
NO came the sharp, loud reply, and the Nihilego retracted considerably at first. Luke was… so stubborn. Why was this human so stubborn? Did he not know? Did he not realize he was so fragile? Apparently these thoughts reached Luke, however, because for a brief moment, he set down his things. Nilly, I need you to understand, I need to work. I need to finish this. You won’t go home unless I work hard.
But….
Please understand, please stop. Let me get back to work. For about thirty minutes, the Nihilego let him be only to start up again with lesser force. Luke pushed back, however, and it retreated some.
This would… go on for quite some time. While he couldn’t always control what the Nihilego did when he was sleeping, Luke took counter measures for a lot of things. He explained to the lab assistants that they would have to be working a bit more independently from now on and assured them that they could get along without him just fine. He did take breaks, more breaks than usual, yet they were timed. Whenever Nilly pushed for something, Luke pushed back that it was not yet time, that they could wait just a little longer. It was something of a compromise, and Luke appreciated it.
…And he did feel better to some degree, honestly. The strict regulation was something he probably needed more of in his life considering how quickly it descended into monotony and white noise chaos. Perhaps this was not completely ignoring or abandoning or plowing through the Nihilego’s will inducement, but it was accommodating it working around it, and focusing as much as he could when he had the time to.
1098 words.
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Post by SGYUMI on Nov 12, 2017 8:05:14 GMT -8
A small accident with the machinery has temporarily blinded Luke's one good eye. Still, determined to work, (and assured his eye would heal given a few hours) Luke has to swap to his new Nihilego eye to continue his work. It's not perfect, but learning to work with an unusual visual input will definitely increase his dexterity....probably...
these are hard okay?
950 words
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Pokémon League
Professor of Botany
Any trainer that can't afford medicine can come to me. |
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PLAYED BY OOC NAME
PLAYED BY Jayspurr
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Post by Luke Indigo on Nov 13, 2017 18:43:10 GMT -8
Luke stood there, tapping his foot ever so slowly. Stewart looked back and forced a shaky smile. “It… it was working yesterday, I promise, it was— I think Holly touched it last!” the younger man spoke in a quick, weak, almost pained way that Luke had to wonder how he maintained through his days. “She hasn’t been balancing it properly! She even uses the wrong tubes for it! I’d never do—”
“Stewart shut up for a second.” Stewart shut up, and Luke sighed leaning over the centrifuge and its broken battered contents. The central ring was completely twisted while the exterior protector had been smashed and battered. The smell of bacterial waste and break down was too strong to be leaning so fully down in it but here he was. Ugh… Did they have no respect for lab equipment? Did they not know how expensive this stuff was? The rotor alone was over a thousand dollars, over half their monthly assistantship paycheck. A gold eye raised back to Stewart again. However, the man had slipped away in the moments that Luke had been looking down. Luke had to wonder where he thought he could run to and keep his job.
“Fine, I’ll do it myself.” A soft, frustrated sigh escaped from Luke as he went to fish up some gloves and alcohol. This was going to require cleaning and Arceus knew what else, and Luke hated it. Ugh what the hell was with this disgusting rotor? Did they not even clean up the— A spring unexpectedly burst forth and beaned him right in the eye. A sharp noise resounded form Luke, and those in the lab rather quickly sifted out onto their lunch break. Luke grit his teeth and started over towards the bathroom. Washing out his eye was a rather simple task, but as he did so, Luke did notice how it seemed to swell. Was that— Ugh, had he bruised it? It hadn’t even hurt like that, why was it swelling?
Calculating the rate of swelling, you may not be able to use it for a day or two… the Nihilego surmised. It had since stolen bits and pieces of Luke’s extensive anatomy knowledge for itself and used its powerful processing components to measure. Luke groaned. Closing his eye, he debated taking the rest of the day off. If he couldn’t see, then there was no real point— But what about the Ultra Aura detector… Even if he couldn’t work with his plants and chemicals, he wanted to work on that later in the day. Ugh…. That was frustrating. Chewing the inside of his mouth, he considered several options.
Use my eye? The Nihilego suggested, cutting through Luke’s thoughts. You are used to singular ocular focus as the norm so using mine would produce the same effect, would it not? Luke was… not very convinced. Even when he ‘saw’ with two eyes open, things in that eye were… different… in ways he couldn’t quite explain. It wasn’t as bad when he had both eyes open, as it seemed he could correct for things in his mind but— just relying on the Nihilego’s eye? Hm….
He’d have to wait and see on that later that night. He would take the rest of the day off at least for his berry studies and put more pressure on the assistants to get work done in the process. They were less than pleased, and two of them had ganged up on Stewart specifically, but for the most part, they got all the work done themselves. That night, however, Luke would start working on the reader once again.
The Nihilego’s eye was strange at best and confusing at worst. Not having his own eye to compare the vision to, he found it all vaguely round and difficult to focus on at first. Even a flat computer screen had a strange circular effect to it that he didn’t initially know what to do with. He rubbed it a couple of times trying to clear it but found it impossible to. Well, just so long as his hands knew what he was doing, he could code this at least, right? Slowly but surely, his fingers began writing down the loops he was working on. The subtle motions of each finger seemed to soften a bit as he did his best to focus and work. Occasionally he’d have to stop of his own accord and rub that eye. Occasionally Nilly would make him stop instead and complain that he needed a break. At midnight he went to bed for his sake and the Nihilego’s.
The next morning the bruising was worse— so much so that he couldn’t even open that eye now. Irritated, Luke threw all the berry work on the assistants and spent a lot of the day in his office writing codes. He got the biggest chunk done that he had in a while, and that night, he picked up a screw driver and forced himself to put the machine together. Carefully… carefully… that was right. SHOOT FUCK NO WAIT— Ok, no, it was fine. He was fine. He could deal with this. Just pick up the screw and the gear and put it back and ugh why was this so hard with this weird eye to even find stuff? Ugh… Almost there. Almost perfect. Nope shoot ugh no stop. There we go- wait. FUCK. No wait… right. Fix that… right…
Strangely enough, this change in sight made him more aware of his own physical movements, each muscle and each tendon worked in time. He could almost feel more than he could see. It was… fascinating really, and an experience he decided to take note of for future reference. It was three in the morning, and a good portion of the machine had been put together. Synching it up to the computer, he began to start downloading the information onto it. He… really needed to get some sleep huh.
1000 words.
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Post by SGYUMI on Nov 14, 2017 5:31:18 GMT -8
Second-hand Dexterity!
The machine is actually complete...but it's hard to tell if it works. You see, you're practicaly pulsing with two different sources of ultra aura, and its near impossible to tell if the machine is working, or going off randomly with thw two of you involved. Luckily, a certain benefactor just built a radiation proof testing facility! Step into the the aura-proof cage, and start working the controllers of the little robot hands to turn on, and test your device.
Welcome to the most awkward claw machine game you have ever played.
1000
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Pokémon League
Professor of Botany
Any trainer that can't afford medicine can come to me. |
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PLAYED BY OOC NAME
PLAYED BY Jayspurr
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Post by Luke Indigo on Nov 14, 2017 18:52:34 GMT -8
How many weeks had it been? Luke didn’t want to know, didn’t want to count. He was exhausted and wrung out, and if he thought too much on it, he’d actually be angry— with himself more than anyone else. If he’d just been a little faster at coding, a little more gifted in the way of building, had any extra skill in excess, he would have done it much faster. He wouldn’t have struggled as much…..
But then again, he’d done it, hadn’t he? He, Luke Indigo, had built the Ultra Aura detector with his own two hands, with his own technical skill, with his own dexterity at every step of the way, and ok yeah that did feel pretty great. It felt… refreshing in a way similar to when he had perfected the isolation of the main compound in the Chroma Cookie. It had been a lot of work, a lot of struggle, but it had worked. That was all that mattered.
…….Luke really hoped this would work.
He’d transferred all his work: his machine, his codes, his wires and parts and pieces and whatever the hell else he needed! Ok, maybe it was less than that but still. Still. All of it was now in the research lab at Alto, and he found himself setting up the machine. Once he put it behind glass, he couldn’t touch it again until all the tests were run. He knew that, understood that, accepted that… but still was not pleased about that.
Perhaps if Nilly wasn’t on his skin and perhaps if he wasn’t a faller from another world, he could be sure that the large readings he kept receiving so close were due to some error in the process. Or perhaps, he could be sure that there was a lot of Ultra Radiation in the area. Perhaps he could have started to make inferences and judgments and all kinds of things about what was going on. Unfortunately, because of the situation however, he just… could not be sure, could not be convinced. Ugh, anyways.
At least Marceline had the facility up and running by then. At least she had bought what he asked in the lab including a chamber that allowed him to control the flow of radiation through very strong barriers. At least everything had come together so that he could keep working. At least he hadn’t passed out yet from the stress and strain of the situation.
Luke exhaled weakly. He wanted to laugh or something but couldn’t figure out why. C’mon, it would all be good, right? Right?
Taking the controls of the crane-like arm that maneuvered itself around in the sealed chamber, Luke frowned on finding how stiff and harsh they were. Oh it’s… It was new no wonder. No one had ever used it before had they? Aside from building it, obviously, but if he had to take a guess, some of it was put together by machines alone. No wonder… But that… still did not help the situation. Frowning a bit as he twisted it around and fumbled with the fine motor control, he decided to at least make sure he knew what he was doing before messing with the machine he’d spent so much time and effort on.
Luke ended up not doing the thing. Not that day at least. He got distracted by the metal arm and figuring out the key forms and fashions and several other things and just.. Ok maybe he was covering up the fact that he was nervous about doing this and just didn’t want to. Perhaps the Nihilego knew it too and had been trying without success for several hours to quell his fears. Perhaps he just needed to sleep it off. Yes, that was clearly what he needed to do.
He didn’t go into work the next day either— not work there anyways. He focused most of his time and effort on his lab in Sinclair and helping out the research assistants. What know of course he wasn’t avoiding doing work! He just had a lot of work to get done, and that project was just one on a list of many. Internally, Nilly swayed, and Luke was aware it was frustrated not with the progress so much as him. It knew. He knew. Luke would sigh and apologize or at least try to.
Explaining why he was struggling was the hardest. It wasn’t as though he hadn’t prepared for this. It wasn’t as though he hadn’t strove for this. It wasn’t as though he hadn’t built up everything for a solid month for this— OK, yes it was totally that. All of that. It was… the fear that all of it would come to naught, that he wouldn’t be able to prove what he could do— what he knew he could do. It hurt. He hurt, and he was scared. The Nihilego did its best to comfort him. It didn’t … know how to process his feelings, but it accepted them. Luke supposed that was better than what most people tried to do. He appreciated the notion.
The next day, Luke went back to work. He took hold of the controls and focused on the fluid steady motions required to manipulate it around. Twisting this way and that, he turned on his precious machine and began to run through diagnostics and then finally the sweeping screen of the area. Luke’s breath held tight, but when the steady beeps of nothingness resounded, he slowly let it out. It worked… It worked in that sense. He’d have to run more tests but— this was a huge step. He could work with this. Nilly…. Nilly was proud, and it made Luke feel pretty good too.
More than ten hours would be spent fine tuning and testing the machine. Using his own clothes and trace remnants as testing fodder, he honed down the Ultra Aura detector and then seemed to have an epiphany on how to make it focus not on him mid-motion. So long as he made it focus on the flow of Ultra Aura rather than its simple presence, he’d be able to detect all kinds of portals and the like! This would help Nilly!
After all the tests were run, Luke rested his face down on the desk and slept harder than he had all month.
words: 1089
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Staff Emeritus
PLAYED BY OOC NAME
PLAYED BY Tagger
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Post by Tagger on Nov 15, 2017 14:20:56 GMT -8
Dexbabby Status: Achieved
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