on a lark

[alicornucopia]

She combs and combs the world aside and there is another world, just ahead, and she steps in.

The combed-away hole closes behind her. She puts her comb in her pocket.

Thanjen (Unbitwise)

Blueberry (kappa)

Hivers (Rockeye)

Comments

[wind_on_my_face]

He moves the mirror to the side so they can see the machine sitting at the focus. Bright glare and heat shimmers obscure one end.

“The engine has a hot part and a cold part. The hot part is kept hot by the sunlight. The cold part is kept cold by blowing air over it. Inside, it moves air between the hot and cold parts, and as the air gets hotter or colder it pushes on other moving parts, and that keeps it running. And all the energy that's left over is stored.”

[alicornucopia]

Frown. "And you can use that energy the same as pushing energy for forcepatterning?"

[wind_on_my_face]

“It's turning the heat into pushing.”

[alicornucopia]

"By the moving parts?"

[wind_on_my_face]

“Yes.”

[alicornucopia]

"How much energy can stuff store?"

[wind_on_my_face]

“I could fly all the way around the world and back here, if I didn't have to stop for other supplies anyway.”

[alicornucopia]

"What would I need to do to make a machine like that?"

[wind_on_my_face]

“It's all shaped and forcepatterned for the moving parts, so you need to learn the shapes. You need metal to make the hot and cold ends, and something black, and a few other materials to make it more efficient but it could work with just metal and glass.”

[alicornucopia]

"I'm not sure if there's any metal on this island besides yours," she says consideringly.

[wind_on_my_face]

“Probably not. You usually buy it.”

[alicornucopia]

"I don't have any money with me."

[wind_on_my_face]

“There aren't any stores to sell it right here, anyway. I can give you some energy for now, or make you another engine you can hook up to, and you can get metal for yourself later. There are other ways to collect energy, too, like from waterfalls or waves or wind.”

[alicornucopia]

"I might not stay here long enough to go to a store and buy metal. Does using wind and waterfalls and waves let you do without?"

[wind_on_my_face]

(Isn't staying here the opposite of leaving?)

“Sure, if you're only using it as slow as those sources provide it. Or if you find a really big waterfall, or a dam, of course.”

[alicornucopia]

"So I just have to let things move my stuff and then it'll charge up the stuff."

[wind_on_my_face]

"Yes, and your stuff has to be trying not to move, but not so hard that it doesn't move. Like this.”

This time, the thing he gives her isn't a transparent sphere. It's an orange dumbbell.

[alicornucopia]

She takes it, frowning at it.

[wind_on_my_face]

It moves like she's trying to stir a jar of peanut butter.

It's perfectly happy to stay where she puts it in midair.

[alicornucopia]

"Is it slowing itself down?"

[wind_on_my_face]

“No, it's connected to the rest of me. If I made it stronger and you pushed hard then you could use it to push me around.”

[alicornucopia]

"Can things slow themselves down? Could I pick a thing up and then drop it and let it fall very slow to charge it up? Or not fall?"

[wind_on_my_face]

“No, you have to have something else to connect it to. If you live in one place a lot you can claim the ground and use that, though.”

[alicornucopia]

"Should I not claim ground if I'm not going to live a place?"

[wind_on_my_face]

“It just takes hours, and you can use stuff on top of the ground instead, which you can move with you.”

He points at the ring of thin glass on the sand around them that followed them down from the rock.