Stark Industries, Saturday morning

[kenselvren]

Jalian had missed a few weeks due to the oddities of the island, but she was back here again now, working on her Doorway.

Which apparently meant she also had to work?

"Fine," she told JARVIS, "I will write labels for these things. Do you have the vacuum tubes I need?"

If anybody needed anything, Jalian would be here, alternately building circuits and categorizing a new shipment of parts.



[Open post! No OCD.]

Comments

[era_two_triangle]

So, Peridot had been told to seek employment at the human business, Stark Industries. She had no idea when the manager was going to be in, and she wasn't going to admit how long she had spent wandering around the streets trying to read the names of each place she went. But eventually, she found her way here, and made her way inside.

To pause. And to blink at the familiar face at work here. And to tilt her head.

"Are you the manager? I'm looking for a... job."

Wrong day of the week, 'Dot.

[kenselvren]

Jalian looked up and didn't quite smile, but looked a bit more pleasant than she had when scowling at her work. "Peridot, cut 5." She bowed a little to the being. "I'm not the manager. That is Tony Stark, I think."

At least, he was the one who'd agreed to let her work on things here in return for minding the shop.

[era_two_triangle]

Well, that seemed promising. Peridot tilted her head at Jalian thoughtfully, and then nodded.

"Then I'll speak with the Tony Stark about the possibility of my finding employment here in exchange for human 'money,'" she decided. And then, because manners seemed... useful, in situations like these, she added, "Thank you, Jalian d’Arsennette y ken Selvren. Do you know where I might find the Tony Stark?"

Things like 'work hours' hadn't really occurred to her yet.

[kenselvren]

"Here," Jalian said. "Only not now. When I saw him here, it was a Monday."

She snorted, glad to have maybe finally found someone who shared her opinion. "Money is ridiculous; nearly everything here seems to rely upon it."

[era_two_triangle]

"I'd happily do work in exchange for the things I need," Peridot muttered sourly. "I have too much free time as it is, around here. But I think I can keep myself occupied until Monday."

Probably. It would be difficult, but she'd manage.

Possibly by spitefully throwing things off a roof. Not people, though. She didn't want to get yelled at again.

[kenselvren]

"That is what I do here," Jalian agreed. "I need to build things, and they have parts. I only wanted to try to get some with money, but Tony Stark said I could have them if I worked." She shrugged.

[era_two_triangle]

Peridot tilted her head at that, looking thoughtful.

"Would you say he's thoughtful, so far as humans go, then?"

As humans, or males, or whatever other rubric they were measuring Tony Starks in these days. Peridot just needed to know what she was going to try to get herself into, here.

[kenselvren]

Jalian thought about it. "He is not unreasonable. He was practical."

He'd put up with Jalian's own bluntness.

[era_two_triangle]

Considering Peridot's bluntness, that was kind of important.

"Oh, good." Peridot visibly sagged with relief. "There aren't nearly enough practical people around here. I was starting to worry that you and the Rufus were it."

And occasionally the Gratuity. And not even always the Rufus.

[kenselvren]

Jalian frowned. "I do not know Rufus. I may have to meet...them." She had no idea if "Rufus" had a gender or what it was; she hadn't heard that name before.

"Many of the beings here make no sense to me," she confided. "Or they do, and I want to hit them until they stop being stupid."

Which she didn't do. Often.

[era_two_triangle]

Peridot... was no good at hitting, though she could certainly appreciate the urge.

"Have you tried?" It was an important question, really. "Has it worked?"

[kenselvren]

"Occasionally," Jalian admitted. "It hasn't helped that I have noticed. Except that males learn that some women are more dangerous than they thought."

Which was at least a tiny win?

[era_two_triangle]

Peridot gave her head a bemused shake.

"Underestimating your capabilities is such a ridiculous miscalculation," she decided. "Even if you weren't as strong as them, you're still clearly smarter, and the superior strategist. They wouldn't stand a chance."

The nebulous 'they' that was 'basically everyone.'

[kenselvren]

Jalian snorted. She'd take 'they' to mean 'all males everywhere'.

"The males here think females are stupid and weak, and that they are better than all of them. Well," she conceded, "not most of the males here on the island, but the ones in most of the world the island comes from."

From her vast experience of Baltimore and TV.

[era_two_triangle]

Peridot just smirked a little at that.

"They should meet some real warriors," she mused. "The we could see how strong they think they are, then. Homeworld has plenty, even if they're not technically female, either. They certainly aren't male."

And if it wasn't for the Crystal Gems, they could basically raze Earth to the ground and take it over in an afternoon. Easy.

[kenselvren]

"Ken Selvren Huntresses would kill them all easily," Jalian agreed. "Most of the males here are not true warriors at all. Most ken Selvren males would kill them easily, and they learn only basic self-defense!"

To be fair, ken Selvren were all evolved for speed and sturdiness, and the males spent a lot of time farming and building.

[era_two_triangle]

"That sounds like the sort of strength that Homeworld might actually respect," Peridot noted, thoughtfully. "It would be interesting to see how your people hold up to even the Rubies from mine."

Basic foot soldiers, essentially.

Stupid ones.

But strong.

[kenselvren]

"I would like to see that," Jalian agreed. "But I do not know if your Homeworld exists in my timeline."

[era_two_triangle]

"I'm not sure either," Peridot admitted with a sigh. "And I don't have the authority to command any number of Rubies around. We'll have to continue to speculate, I suppose."

[kenselvren]

"Yes," Jalian agreed.

"What things do you need?" she asked. "I can see if they're here; Tony Stark may need to order them if they aren't."

[era_two_triangle]

"Either some sort of instrument to allow me to focus on and affect repairs at a finely detailed level," Peridot replied, "or some means of creating a flask robonoid that can do the work in a fraction of the time. My screen is broken, and I have yet to find a human tool or piece of technology that interfaces with it without some... improvisation."

[kenselvren]

Jalian nodded. "I will ask about the 'flask robonoid', but I am not familiar with that. How finely detailed do you need to see?"

[era_two_triangle]

"It's circuitry," Peridot explained, sounding a little frustrated. Not at the questions, but at the situation. "Circuitry that would be easily replaced on Homeworld, but of course there's nothing quite like it here on Earth."

Her fingers floated free of her hand in the first place. Earth hadn't quite figured out levitation.

"I'd need to be able to run a proper diagnostic on my screen, figure out the extend of the physical damage possibly running right down to a near microscopic level, and then manipulate or replace those broken pieces. Somehow."

Really, making the robonoid would be much easier, and Peridot wasn't certain half the substances found in those were even available on Earth.

[kenselvren]

"They have circuitry here, but it probably isn't the same," Jalian agreed. "We do have lenses for seeing closely, though."

She stood and led Peridot back over to one of the work tables where there was a frame with a magnifying glass in it. "Is this detail enough? There are more, I think. JARVIS?"

"There is a microscope in the cabinet on the wall to your left," JARVIS answered. "Mr Stark has an electron microscope in his lab."

[era_two_triangle]

Peridot was filing away the locations of the microscopes even as she jumped and looked around, wide-eyed.

"Who said that?!"

[kenselvren]

"JARVIS is an artificial intelligence," Jalian said. "He has speakers built into the wall."

[era_two_triangle]

Oh. Well. Peridot turned a slow and cautious look towards the wall.

It was definitely a wall, there.

"What function does he serve?"

Look, her entire race was basically, technically, artificial intelligence. Non-organic life forms that were built, not born? Yep. But random voices were just too much.