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Blackstone Foundry and Forge; Friday [10/08].

With a nice trip to look forward to next week and the comfort of not having to be awkward if a certain person who had cried on her and who she let hug her and actually talked to about emo...about emooot....about feel---about things with asked anything about her Plus One, Amaya was ready to squeeze in at least two more days in the shop before shutting her down for the week and for Sunday, and part of that preparation meant finally deciding on which designs and prototypes for Dr. Leceter's silverware set she liked best, so she could put togehter a nice sampling for him to look over and consider before getting back to her, maybe, to see if he liked any of those styles or had some suggestions to go off of them.

Granted, she had also planned to hopefully take a look at some stuff while she was in the city to see if there were any inspirations with silverware up there in Boston, too, but this would give him something to chew on (get it? Because forks and knives and--you got it) while she was gone, perhaps.

Of course, she'd never once gotten back from one of these trips without about fifty other points of inspiration and new things to work on, so that was all the more reason to make sure to finish up whatever projects she had hanging around still before she left.

She still kind of wished she could take the lobsters with her, too, but she was sure they'd be in safe hands while she was gone. Honestly, she was a little more worried about the plants, but, well, Lucille owned a whole shop for plants, she was sure they would be fine!

The Forge is open!

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A blacksmith's forge was not, generally speaking, the kind of place Irene usually intentionally put herself. There was noise and smoke and fire and she was wearing silk, thank you.

But, despite appearances, she had also never let the prospect of getting dirty get in the way of learning. And she also thought the blacksmith herself was cute, and had been invited to visit, so...here she was, wandering in and peering around curiously.

"Two anvils. You didn't exaggerate."

Amaya looked up from where she was currently comparing two forks that, for most people, probably looked exactly the same, but she had been carefully accessing the very subtle differences that she knew were there because she'd put them there and couldn't decide which she liked better, and was immediately a bit surprised to see that Irene actually had stopped in. After all, she was wearing silk, for crying out loud! Not to mention the fact that, if Irene was making good on her part of their brief interaction at the 3MD by stopping into Amaya's shop, then that meant that Amaya would have to make good on her part by stopping into Irene's, and...

Ahhhhhh, zards.

Well, maybe she'd conveniently manage to forget about it over the next week?

(She would not conveniently manage to forget about it over the next week.)

So with that moment of feeling not at all surprised that this week would not only bring a crying, clinging Seivarden to her but also Irene Adler, she paused, then blinked, then looked over at the anvils in question.

"Yup," she confirmed. "There's two of them. You never know when a second anvil's going to come in handy, after all."

Plus, you know, the whole fact that there was, at one point, supposed to actually be two blacksmiths here, but then that other one had to go and confirm everything Amaya's old pops had always told her about how there's no good in getting attached to anyone or anything, because they'll all just leave anyway, but there was no point in getting into any of that right now.

"I mean," she offered, "have you even seen the size of the swords some people weild around here??"

And to think! She hadn't even seen Gladio's, yet!

Edited 2021-10-08 13:13 (UTC)

Those did look like identical forks to Irene's untrained eye, yes. And as incongruous as she felt in here, it was still interesting, and unlike her own usual haunts -- including her clean, bright, about-to-be remodeled shop -- that she kind of couldn't help looking around in open curiosity.

"I've not seen all that many swords," Irene admitted, "but then I'm usually not looking." That was a pretty good double entendre, if she said so herself! And it was also true! "And to be honest, I wouldn't have even thought you'd need a second anvil for particularly large items, so that's fascinating. I figured it was more just a backup. In case one...breaks?"

She made a helpless little face, shrugging, because that probably wasn't the right word but she was curious and asking questions anyway!

(Which was what she encouraged in her own, totally-not-daunting shop. Curiosity and questions! That's how you got comfortable with anything.)

There was certainly no lack of double entendres around this shop at any given time, but, unlike the double anvils, they almost always went right over Amaya's head.

Which was just about the perfect level of comfort with regards to that sort of thing for her, thank you very much.

But her eyebrows lifted in a different sort of way at the question, looking a little impressed at the thought of it and shaking her head a little as she considered the anvils again. "If I ever actually managed to break one of these bad boys," she stated stuanchly, "I'd be mighty impressed with myself. Or have to have a firm word with the person I got 'em from! But it also suits me well if I've got more than one project going at a time," which was pretty much any time, if she was lucky!, "and it helps when I do blacksmithing classes over the summers. Sure, we could have multiple anvils available in the danger shop, but I'll firmly stand by my position that there's just no substitute for the real thing. It's just not the same as feeling that real heat in your face from the forge, the real way the metal moves under a good strong hammer, that perfectly hone balance of a solid hilt in your hands...Can't be beat!"

"There's something about knowing it's artificial that makes it...just lesser," Irene agreed, having tangled with the danger shop herself a time or two (though she had used it mostly to recreate shopping experiences for her fashion class.) She also had to smile a little wider, not only because that enthusiasm was frankly sort of adorable, but also because Irene enjoyed meeting people who clearly really loved what they did for work. "How long have you been a blacksmith? I'll admit they're not really a thing when I'm from -- 'least, not that I'm aware of."

Perhaps in Colonial Williamsburg, or something. (Ooh, actually, there might be reenactors next week! That would be a delight!)

Oh, the reenactors were always an interesting one for Amaya...although usually not as interesting as Amaya was for them!...and one of these days, maybe someone might finally make good on their threat to drag her to a Ren Faire...

That person would, however, have to be willing to subject themselves to what would ultimately be a day of listening to her rant about how they'd gotten everything (well...mostly everything) all wrong and why...

"Yeah," Amaya's expression went a little wry, "I hear they're not really a thing where a lot of people 'round here are from. Which, really, is great news for me, because that means there's always a hole in the market I can just wedge myself right into without having to worry about much competition! Not that I mind, of course, a little competition. A little competition's good for work, actually, keeps you on your toes, keeps things a bit more interesting, but, heck, even if people are just in it for the novelty of it in this day and age, that's still money and interest coming my way, I'll take it."

Her arms folded in front of herself a little at that point, her head tilted as she considered Irene and these questions as if there might be some kind of ulterior motive to them, but, really, they seemed simple enough and if there was a genuine interest there...

"And I started my apprenticeship when I was fifteen," she offered. "A bit late, to be honest, for most smiths where I'm from, but, well, it took a while for me to figure out what it was I wanted to do with myself, not to mention finding someone who'd take me on who also met my own standards. I didn't want to learn from just any old hack, after all, I wanted to get in with the best. Wasn't too long after that I went around, trying to figure out where to set up my own shop until I landed in a place called Daventry, and, once things got a little too quiet around there for my tastes--quiet towns? Don't pay the bills--I wound up here."

And that had been quite its own ordeal, at first, too...and whether Irene was here out of genuine curioisity, because she was leading up to a project, or even just to corner Amaya into having return the favor of a visit to their respective shops, she didn't want to bore the poor woman with all those details.

And it would probably have been the polite thing to do, to return the curiousity in kind and ask about Irene's own occupation a bit, but, well, some bridges you avoided having to cross unless you absolutely had to.

Once upon a time, there absolutely would have been an ulterior motive, but today Irene's sole reason for being here was getting to know a pretty, chatty brunette. Well, that, and the sheer drive of getting to learn about something that she knew nothing about, personally, and actually did find sort of archaically interesting! But mostly she was here because she'd been invited, and because she liked how Amaya had blushed on their little three-minute date, and because any time there was something she hadn't done before -- like visiting a blacksmith -- Irene wanted to try it.

"I'm going to venture a guess that Daventry is a bit further away than simply another country?" Irene suggested, raising an eyebrow. "Or are you displaced in time, as well? I had a student years ago who was from the time of the war for American independence, and the poor little duckling seemed like he was constantly out of his depth, but you seem remarkably well-adjusted for a blacksmith who looks like she came from a renaissance faire."

She looked around, trying to decide if she wanted to lean against something and fluidly turning the motion into inspecting her nails, instead. "I didn't get started in my career quite as young as you did," she added with a smile. "Even if fifteen is late by your standards." And see, Irene was generally pretty good about toeing that line between making someone outright uncomfortable versus hinting at what she did, so she left it there.

Yeah, leaning on anything in this shop was probably a good way to get that nice pretty outfit you had on smudged or scraped, stained, torn, or some other varying degree of ruined, Irene.

And that hint just got a faint huff out of Amaya, who added in a "Well, I should hope not!" for good measure, although there was a good chance that the commentary hadn't exactly been intentionally out loud.

"Daventry," she said, then, with the intention of trodding her heavy boots mostly on more familiar ground, "is in a completely different realm, as far as I understand it, one with loads more magic and a lot less electricity. But I've been here for..." Waaaay longer than she cared to think about! "...a while now, but even back then, I assure you, soon as I heard about indoor plumbing, you weren't going to hear a peep of complaint out of me about how this place!"

It helped, too, that even before coming here, she'd had a healthy interest in developing her own technologies, and being here just exacerbated that and leaned her a little bit away from what could have been called a full-fledge steampunk stage.

And, since this seemed much safe territory, her head tilted as she asked, "Safe to assume you're from somewhere a bit more modern, yourself, Irene?"

Irene hid a smile at that huffy commentary, because she did tend to agree (though she'd also dipped her pedicured toes in sex work not all that much later, in university, because that turned out to be where all the money lived!)

"I'm from England, and not quite a decade ago," she offered easily. "Bit fewer adjustments than I'd imagine you had -- technology's a skosh better and sleeves seem to have come back in fashion, but it's not too different. But very much in this realm, just across an ocean."

Though, likely, she was from a slightly different universe, and this was where the multiverse stuff really started getting confusing for her, so probably just easier to pretend that if you took a flight to Heathrow and managed a couple stops on the Tube, you'd wind up right in Irene's neighborhood.

"Can you do magic, hailing from a magical realm and all?" she asked, with a slightly amused sort of interest. Partly because she was nakedly jealous of anyone who could do magic or had superpowers or anything like that and thus was curious, but also because Amaya didn't line up with her current perception of magicians.

And the fact that the next huff out of Amaya was a full-on snort should give Irene a good idea that her current perception was pretty on-point. "Not even a little!" she declared, thrusting her chin up proudly at that fact. "And if you knew most magicians from where I'm from, you'd understand that that's a good thing! Oh, sure, sure, I'll allow that there's a few good ones mixed up in the lot of them, but, for the most part, if they're not complete and total hack frauds, then they're just downright evil or unpleasant! Always looking for the easy way out, wizards and witches, but I will say this much: at least they also always seem to get what's coming to them. The good ones, well, they're fine, and you don't hear about them much because of it, but the bad ones? Well, they'll take it to the extreme and make everyone's life miserable for a good long while until someone finally manages to serve them their just desserts, and then another one's right there, ready to take their place! In that regard, I'd rather take the hack frauds claiming to know magic when really, they're just bad apothecarists and tricksters. At least then, the harm they do is negligible."

You wanted a chatty brunette, Irene? Well, you definitely got one, by bringing Amaya's opinions on magic into the picture.

"I will give this place that much," she allowed. "Any magic users I've come across here seem to be the good sort. You could even say I've started dabbling in a little bit of it myself, thanks to this stuff called materia that I can now infuse some of my weapons with, but if you ask me, that's less magic and more science that's a bit harder to explain than most."

There was a small pause in the rant, her head tilting, hand coming up to her chin thoughtfully.

"Though I suppose you could say the same about a lot of magic, really..."

And now, if she didn't have that pesky trip ahead of her next week, she'd be buckling down trying to discect and figure out How Materia all over again instead.

"Well, you know, Clarke's third law," Irene offered, and you know what, Irene, Amaya probably did not know about the opinions of twentieth century science fiction authors, so it was probably best that she elaborated. "'Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic,' and all that. Infusing weapons with this materia certainly sounds more like science than the magic I've seen recently. And you could probably extend that to, say, superpowers -- my best mate can stick her hand through a table and I believe she'd tell you it's science, but I'd argue it's also just magic wearing a different set of clothes."

Which, on that note, she did hold up a placating hand. "And I've not met any witches or wizards that have seemed evil, at least, thus far." Self-serving and morally flexible, certainly, but who wasn't? And who wouldn't be, when able to magically pull money from a cashpoint? "Or particularly...hack fraud-ish. But I've always figured there must be loads of them out there! The good ones seem to make it here, but there's got to be just piles of incompetent and-or evil magic users just plaguing their realms!"

"Well," said Amaya, staunchly, with a firm nod that made it clear that her mind wasn't likely to budge on this any time soon, even though it seemed she and Irene were more of less in general agreement about the matter, "let's just hope they plan on staying there, then, because this here island's got enough of its own topsy-turvy magic nonsense going on without mucking it up with the likes of those who fancy kidnapping boys for slaves or princesses for towers or just sticking any wayward traveler who'll fit inside a cooking pot!"

All of which were quite the issues, back home!

You know, now that she metioned it, it probably wasn't all that surprising that Amaya generally preferred staying here after all...

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Blackstone Foundry and Forge; Friday [10/08].

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