Gathering Materials (Kaeson, Nai'shee)

[Minerva Agatha Zipporah]

"Aye, good a place as any," Tock said, looking around. There was more she could get out here than just the wood. She started marching her crutches around the area, examining the ground. She used Grippy, her extendable arm, to reach down and retrieve some stones she found in the area. She was collecting them to start making metalsmithing molds so she could make her own gears. She started piling the stones she found in the corner of the wagon, collecting a decent sized pile of them over the time they were there. Meanwhile, James collected some wood for a small campfire so they could cook. Minerva looked at Kaeson when the fire was being built and asked, "Oy, yer an 'erbman, aye? Anythin' 'round 'ere what's good fer ta eat? I's starved..." She didn't know what plants were edible or not, unless they got lucky and found a fruit bearing tree. But maybe Kaeson knew better and could find them something that would make for a good lunch. After awhile when Tock saw the axe needed adjustment, she called out commands to it, "Stop! Forward... forward..." The axe ceased chopping and stepped forward, adjusting its angle slightly. "Chop!" she called out, and he began cutting anew. She'd need to adjust his position like that from time to time throughout the afternoon, to ensure the axe cut cleanly all the way through the tree. Minerva then continued scouring the area for stones, with Naily trailing after her most of the time, yipping at her heels. She scoured through the underbrush, using Grippy to clear away loose debris, searching for any good, solid stones she could find that would make for good carving. Flatter stones were best, since it'd be less work for her to smooth them out that way. Most of the ones she collected were about the size of her fist, so each would be about the right size to carve out a mold for a single gear in each one.

[Kaeson Dakano]

"Uh," Kaeson started, looking around for anything edible. "Yeah, I probably could. I think I saw some wild onions over on the other side of the clearing." Kaeson said, adding,"I mean, even if I can't find anything I've heard good things about oak bark," Kaeson laughed and made a face at the thought. No, he would find something else to eat. Starting off at the edge of the clearing, Kaeson waved at James, Tock, and Nai'shee as he ventured deeper into the forest.

Making sure the camp was still in clear sight, Kaeson slowly began to work his way around the clearing, taking care to take a detailed look at anything that could be food. Kaeson also made sure to steer clear of any plants that stemmed with three leaves, as his grandmother always said "Leaves of Three, Let it Be." Kaeson was more then familiar with poison ivy and oak, and was wary to repeat any experience with the two -- let alone eat them. Avoiding strange looking fungi and moss, Kaeson stayed true to the plants he knew to be food. Like wild onion. Luckily, Kaeson seemed to have stumbled upon a patch of what he thought to be the delicious root. "It smells like onion...," Kaeson mumbled to himself, taking great care in identifying the grassy plant. "Long, slender leaves - check. Onion smell - check," Vocalizing a 'is it wild onion or not' checklist made it easier on Kaeson to identify the plant. Grabbing the plant by it's leaves, Kaeson grinned as he saw the oh-so-familiar pale root system.

Continuing his circular path around the campsite clearing, Kaeson gathered a variety of nuts to eat as well. He passed a couple of bushes with berries but decided against risking it -- Kaeson had no idea on how to cure poising. Passing through the forest once more, Kaeson was fortunate to find some dandelions as well. Looking down at his gatherings, Kaeson frowned as he realized how meager the portions were. Kaeson sighed, and headed back to camp.

Glad to see the fire started, Kaeson walked up before dropping his earnings right by the warm fire pit. Kaeson said, "We'll need to boil the nuts and the flowers before we eat them, and we could start eating the onions raw...they'll probably taste better of we boil them with everything else though. Anyone bring a pan?"

[Minerva Agatha Zipporah]

Tock snorted and shook her head, letting out a chuckle. "Oy," she said, "no pans, no cookin' stuff, an' only one axe... Some woodsmen we is..." James shrugged and asked her, "Can't you magic one up?" He made a circular motion with his hand, as if to indicate conjuring a pan out of the air. Tock snorted and laughed, leaning forward and bobbing back and forth in her crutches. "Oy, aye!" she said, laughing. "I'll jus' snap me fingers an' git us a 'ole kitchen 'ere, aye?" James frowned and gestured towards Choppy, "Well you can do that, so I figured..." Tock sighed and said, "'Ese babies took a good week, 'ey did! Whatcha think I is?" She shook her head, trying to think what else they could do about eating besides being forced to endure raw food. She looked around, lost as to what to do. While carving a pot out of stone was theoretically possible, it would take hours at the least, and was thus completely impractical. Wood was a poor choice if she didn't want the pot itself catching on fire. So how to boil water? "Awright, we's jus' improvise!" she said, and set out to do just that. First she gathered up some sturdy sticks. She pounded these into the ground with her mallet, making sure they made a nice stable base. Then she took her leather apron and used a bit of water to scrub it clean. She then suspended it in between the sticks so the center dipped down, forming a crude container to hold water. She tied the corners firmly to the sticks so they wouldn't come loose. She then gathered up some of the stones that hadn't met her earlier standards for collection. She wiped them clean with a cloth, then rinsed them with some water to get all the dirt off. Once they were clean she placed them eight into the hottest part of the fire. She waited for them to heat up until they had a slight glow, like metal in a furnace. Once they were hot enough, she used Grippy to retrieve them from the fire, dropping them one by one into the water-filled apron. They hissed and steamed, transferring heat from the rocks to the water. It wasn't as ideal as a pot, but the transfer of heat energy would still get the water hot enough.

[Kaeson Dakano]

Seeing the make shift pot completed, Kaeson would dump everything, onions, nuts, flowers -- everything into the leather apron with the heated stones unless someone stopped him. Kaeson had never really had to learn to cook before, and assumed that everything cooked at the same pace. It had never occurred to Kaeson that an acorn might not boil as fast as a dandelion, because why wouldn't it? All the ingredients were going in the same boiling water after all. If no one stopped him, Kaeson would just dump everything he had gathered into the constructed pot and hope for the best.

"I'm not much of a cook," Kaeson muttered, adding," I guess we let everything boil for, I dunno, half a bell?" Sighing, Kaeson sat down besides the boiling pot of water. He knew that the nuts would need at least half a bell to remove their natural bitterness, but Kaeson hadn't the slightest clue on how so much boiling time would effect the flowers and onions. "There'll be something to eat, if anything," Kaeson sighed. He hoped their lunch wouldn't taste that bad.

Quite some time later, Kaeson decided they had waited enough for their lunch. Grabbing the leather apron by its ends, Kaeson carefully took it off it's base. He then placed the apron on the ground, tipping carefully to the side in an attempt to drain some of the boiling water. "SHYKE!" Kaeson yelled, accidently pouring some of the steaming water over his left hand. Only thinking about his own hand, Kaeson let the apron drop causing its contents to flood out as the once make-shift pot hit the ground.

[Minerva Agatha Zipporah]

While the meal was cooking, Minerva occasionally stopped to help stir it and give a taste to see how it was coming along. She didn't know much about cooking; most of her meals consisted of whatever she could put together in the shortest amount of time possible. But she had some spare time today since Choppy was mostly working on auto. So she helped Kaeson to the best of her limited ability, fishing out a bit of food here and there to get a taste, and wishing she had some salt or something to add. She instructed Choppy to adjust here and there, ensuring that he would cut cleanly across the width of the tree. He worked steadily without the need for a rest break, and thus was able to get through the tree far quicker than a human would have been, since they would need to worry about tired muscles, sweat, and exhaustion. Unfortunately, she was too busy redirecting Choppy towards the end of his efforts to notice what Kaeson was doing. When she saw the signs that the tree was about to go down, she called out to Choppy, "Okay Choppy stop! Back! Back!" The axe backed away at her commands, and she watched as the wood of the tree started to creak and bend. She'd had Choppy cutting on the side away from the camp, since the tree would start to lean into the cut, and obviously no one wanted the tree falling on them. Just for fun Tock yelled out, "Tiiiiiimbeeerrrrrr!" bouncing up and down in her crutches and cackling as she saw the tree fall and crash to the ground. Then she heard Kaeson shout from behind her, and turned to see the mess he'd made. "Oy, 'at's our lunch!" she cried out in protest. She unstrapped herself from her crutches and hopped over, looking helplessly at the wet, steaming mess all across the ground. Grumbling, she crouched down on one leg and started picking nuts and onions off the ground, blowing the dirt off them. James sighed and came over to help, muttering, "Well, a messy lunch is better than no lunch at all..." He cast Kaeson a slightly annoyed look. Tock didn't bother with any more complaints. Eating was, to her, a necessity at best. She just choked down the food without much worry for being polite or taking the time to taste it. Once she had enough food in her stomach, she set about organizing the rest of the campsite. She first set Choppy back to work on the tree stump. When it fell, the last slivers of wood had bent and cracked, but weren't fully cut clean. So she had Choppy work to cut through the shattered fragments and finish cutting the tree free of its roots. Then she organized the rest of the group for efficiency. "Oy, so, my babies is gonna work on the main trunk," she told them. "We can work the branches, aye? Best ways fer ta form a line. I'll cut," she pulled out the small carpenter's hatchet from her belt, "an' y'all can clear off the leaves, an' pile the wood in the wagon. Keep 'er off ta the right, aye?" she indicated one side of the wagon, near where she'd been piling her stones. "An' the big pieces is gonna go in the middle." She called out to Cutty to get him started. "Stand!" she said, and the saw rose on its four legs. "Come... stop... Forward... forward..." The saw followed her commands until she had it straddle the bulk of the tree. She set him up at a point partway down the trunk, then told him, "Cut!" The legs started pulling one way, then the next, rocking back and forth to drag the saw blade across the tree, working steadily to cut through. Meanwhile, Tock started using her hatchet at the top end of the tree to hack off branches. She handed these to the others, so the could pull the leaves off, and pile the wood into the wagon. She hummed as she worked, keeping an eye on Choppy and Cutty. Once Choppy was done with the base of the tree, she repositioned him at the top near some of the thicker branches. Naily, having no real work to do here, hung around Tock like an eager puppy, nuzzling her legs and regularly demanding attention in between her work. When Cutty made it clean through the trunk, she called out to him, "Cutty, stop!" The saw kept cutting, digging down into the dirt and grass. Tock paused in her work and stared at him with a frown. "Cutty," she repeated, "stop!" When he kept going she got up and hopped closer, her frown deepening. "Stop! Baby, listen to Mommy! Stop! STOP!" Finally the saw froze in place, the saw blade pushed a few inches into the dirt. Tock hopped up to her baby and laid a hand on his handle, looking him over. Naily, who had been hanging on her heels the whole time she worked, hung back, refusing to come any closer, and trembling a bit on his wheels.

[Kaeson Dakano]

"Hothothothot," Kaeson whined, while simultaneously blowing on his reddening hand. "Petching water!" Kaeson swore angrily, his eye flashing violet. How could he have been so careless? Kaeson couldn't believe he had dropped the apron effictively ruining their lunch, not to mention he had possibly burnt his left hand. Kaeson sighed, turning his left hand this way and that, trying to decide whether or not the injuries were even worth worrying about, but cosidering the slightly swollen and extremely red state of Kaeson's hand, he had no choice but to try and remedy the minor burns. Looking around the clearing Kaeson tried to remeber everything he had learned about treating burns. "I need a cooling agent...and...and," Kaeson mumbled, hopelessly trying to remeber a plant that would soothe his throbbing hand. Looking at the spilt water before him, Kaeson remembered learning something about using mud for burns in his herbalism class -- at least Kaeson thought he had heard something like that. Kneeling before the spilt cooking water, Kaeson quickly passed his good hand over the water trying to gage a temperature; Kaeson was extremely wary of putting his burnt hand in scalding water again and didn't think that would do much cosidering his injuries. Conivinced the water wasn't hot enough to scald his hand again, Kaeson tentatively mixed some of the water and earth to make mud and applied it thoroughly to his left hand.

Looking over, Kaeson saw that the others had salvaged a good chunk of what they had cooked and were now eating lunch. Sitting down besides Nai'shee, Kaeson muttered a quick apology to everyone there. Whether the others even acknowldeged it went unnoticed by Kaeson, he hadn't even looked managed to look them in the eyes. He had heard them complain and protest, but Kaeson had decidedly ignored that considering no one would be eating if he hadn't found anything. Sighing loudly, Kaeson started to eat his portion of the food salvaged. Slowly, Kaeson bite his way through bitter nuts, chewed wilted flowers, and choked down over boiled onions. It certainly wasn't Kaeson ideal meal, but hey, it was food nonetheless.

Finishing lunch, Kaeson listened closely to Tock's instructions. Looking over to James and Nai'shee, Kaeson grinned and said "Looks like we've got it easy, huh? If Tock keeps up building animations like that I doubt anyone will ever need to work again!" he finished laughing. His hunger sated, Kaeson found himself in an increasingly better mood and once again, found himself fascinated with Tock's animations. "I can't wait to see them work," he said to himself.

Slowly, Kaeson followed Tock along the fallen tree making sure to collect the fallen branches and carry them back to the wagon. Every now and then, he get distracted watching Cutty and Choppy do their thing, feeling slightly jealous that Tock had managed to do so much in her animation class. "Maybe I should take a class in the summer season, or maybe try to get a teacher's aid position," Kaeson wondered aloud, he had been wanting to see the animation classrooms since he had arrived at the university.

Finally finished with the branches, Kaeson watched as Tock commanded Cutty through its process. Kaeson frowned as Cutty continued to ignore Tock's commands, wondering if this was a continuing problem with animated saw. "Looks like it needs to be redone," Kaeson thought aloud, not really speaking his opinion out to anyone in particular. Turning away from Cutty, Kaeson asked Tock,"Has he always been like this?" a tone of worry in his voice. Kaeson wasn't exactly thrilled at the notion of an unobedient saw running about the camp.

[Minerva Agatha Zipporah]

Tock turned a glare on Kaeson when he said Cutty needed to be "redone". "Don't say 'at!" she shouted, with tears in her eyes. "'E's jus'... jus' not feelin' good..." She knelt next to her baby and lovingly stroked him, leaning down to kiss Cutty's handle. She whispered softly to him, "Shhh, baby, yer gonna be okay, aye? Don't listen ta the big mean man..." She was worried though. None of her babies had ever acted like this before, and she didn't know what to do about it. She certainly couldn't do anything about it here. She leaned closed to the leather drum that served as Cutty's 'ear' and whispered to him, "C'mon baby, stand up..." The Automaton stood, and Tock took a shuddering breath. "See? 'E's fine..." she said without conviction. She directed the saw to a new position to begin the next cut, watching him carefully as she gave the commands and he started cutting again. Everything seemed fine now... she just had to hope there weren't any more problems. She looked down at poor Naily, who kept looking between her and Cutty. He seemed like he wanted to rush over to her heels like he usually did, but he was afraid to. Tock limped over to Naily (having left her crutches off to the side during this stage of the work), and scooped the little wheeled hammer up into her arms, kissing the top of his head. "S'okay, baby," she told him. "Yer brother's jus' fine, 'e is..." She got everyone back to work, not noticing that James was keeping some major distance from all the tools now. She kept a close eye on Cutty as she continued chopping branches, directing the rest of them where to load everything as they went. Between giving commands to her tools, and giving instructions to James, Kaeson, and Nai'shee, Tock had essentially taken on a leadership role, but it was nothing she wasn't used to. She often took charge of work crews on the job site. When the next set of cuts was done, Tock limped carefully over to Cutty and said in a firm voice, "Cutty, stop." Once again he kept on cutting. "Stop... stop! Stop!" she said again and again, until he finally listened. She stroked his handles gently, wishing she knew some Auristics or something so she could figure out what was wrong.

[Kaeson Dakano]

Kaeson carefully watched Tock as she comforted Cutty, sighing as he realized he could have been a bit more tactful regarding the current situation -- Cutty was her 'baby' after all, and he would have acted just as defensively had someone told him Anne or Toy Soldier had to be redone. As an animator Kaeson sympatheized with Tock, but Kaeson was also aware that Cutty was an animated saw and proved much more dangerous then Anne or Toy Soldier even if he weren't so...problematic. Kaeson furrowed his brow, if he wanted Tock to redo, or let him redo Cutty, he would have to be more...diplomatic. Unfortunately, Kaeson had never been one for diplomacy or tact, much preferring to speak whatever came to mind.

Not wanting to anger Tock anymore then he had to, Kaeson did everything she told him too as quick and efficiently as he could manage. Kaeson was the first person to grabbed the sticks as Choppy and Tock cut away at the massive oaks branches, and effectively ran to the wagon to organize all the sticks in a somewhat organized fashion. Kaeson took note of Jameschange of behavior as well. James hadn't seemed exactly comfortable with an axe, hammer, and saw walking about on their own at first, but now it was fairly obvious he was making sure to keep a large distance between him and any of Tock's animations.

Halfway to the wagon carrying a particularly large bundle of branches, Kaeson turned around suddenly as he heard Tock yelling 'STOP' at Cutty.

Kaeson sighed and waited for Tock to stop comforting the young animation to say anything. It didn't seem like the smartest idea to yell out to Tock his opinion on the whole Cutty situation and Kaeson was positive he wasn't going anywhere near the animated saw for the rest of the trip.

The moment Tock was far enough away from Cutty for Kaeson to be comfortable, Kaeson approached her. "Hey, Tock...," Kaeson paused briefly, clearly struggling with stringing together the following sentences. "It's always difficult when...when someone you care about is...sick, but sick people need their medicine, y'know? Sometimes it's hard to deal with but sick people need the medicine to get better and...uh, and it won't hurt them. Or change them," Kaeson stopped, shaking his head as he tried to make some sense out of his own words. "I should've thought this through," Kaeson thought, clearly regretting his lack of forethought. Kaeson sighed heavily, and then continued. "Look at James -- Naily's scared too, you see that, right? Uh, it's difficult -- what I'm trying to say...," Kaeson trailed off, his voice lowering to an indistinguishable mumble.

Kaeson furrowed his brow, clearly strained at trying to keep his argument as tact as possible. Sighing again, Kaeson tried a more direct approach. "Would it be possible to put Cutty to sleep temporarily?" Kaeson asked, making sure to put a strong emphasis on the word 'temporarily'.

[Minerva Agatha Zipporah]

Tock listened quietly at first, wiping tears from her eyes. If Kaeson had talked about Cutty like he was a mere tool, she probably would have decked him. But since he did the proper thing and talked about Cutty like a person (which is what he WAS), she just listened and nodded. He was right... Cutty needed a doctor. An Animation doctor. Except she couldn't take him to the University. They might take him away. She knew what people did with sick dogs, if they thought they'd become feral and dangerous. And she would murder anyone who tried to take her baby away. She loved her babies. She was their Mommy. So when Kaeson suggested putting Cutty to sleep, a wild look entered her eyes. She grabbed him by his shirt collar and yanked him forward, leaning in close to his face and hissing dangerously, "Ain't nobody puttin' my baby ta sleep, ya 'ear!? 'E's gonna be fine! When I done gets back ta town, I's gonna make 'im all better. But 'til 'en," she leaned closer, eyes flaring, "'e's gonna finish 'is job like a good boy. Cause 'e's done been lookin' forward ta 'is since 'e were born. Iz what 'e were made fer. An' 'is Mommy ain't gonna tell 'im 'at 'e can't finish 'is special job. 'At'd break 'is poor 'eart, an' I's NOT gonna do 'at ta 'im, aye?" She was breathing in sharp gasps through her teeth, her eyes gleaming dangerously. She released Kaeson's shirt and let him stumble back, breathing deeply through clenched teeth to get control of herself. Then she noticed James staring at her with vie jaw hanging down, and she screamed, "WHAT'RE YA LOOKIN' AT!?" Obviously not wanting to get in the middle of this, he hurried off to busy himself loading more branches. Tock turned back to Kaeson, eyes narrows, fists clenching and unclenching at her sides. With a feral sneer she growled, "We clear, mate?"

[Kaeson Dakano]

For a moment, Kaeson thought he was making some progress with Tock. She seemed to be listening to what he had to say -- at least until he mentioned putting Cutty to sleep.

"Hey!" Kaeson protested as Tock grabbed him by the collar. "What the --," Kaeson started to say, but he immediately fell silent when as he noticed the way Tock was glaring at him. Kaeson eyes widened and flickered yellow as Tock made her own opinion specifically clear. As the enraged gadgeteer laid into him, Kaeson mouth continually opened and close as if he wanted to say something back, but was either too afraid or too shocked by Tock's reaction to articulate his thoughts into words.

Suddenly, Kaeson found himself on the ground -- whether he tripped or was pushed remained unknown to him, he had been trying to figure out what had caused Tock to...to..., "freak out, Kaeson thought, still clearly confused by the whole ordeal.
Looking around, Kaeson saw Tock and thought, "if looks could kill," and slowly stood up while keeping a constant eye on Tock. Kaeson had noticed the way she had been clenching and unclenching her fist, and he had no desire to be on the receiving end of one of Tock's punches.

But he was far from done with Tock. She needed to deal with Cutty now, and Kaeson needed to convince her one way or another.

"No, Tock, we're not clear," Kaeson said, slowly backing out of Tock's punching range. Kaeson had been in a bar brawl alongside Tock before and was in no hurry to feel for himself how much damage she could do. "I never said Cutty couldn't finished his job, and he would only be asleep for a couple of minutes -- at most!" Kaeson added, lowering his voice significantly as he mentioned 'Cutty' and 'asleep'. Kaeson didn't know how aware the animated saw was and what words would set the animation off, but Kaeson didn't want to be the one to upset a walking, thinking saw. Looking back at Tock, Kaeson decided the saw might not be so bad after all.

Looking over to James, Kaeson realized he would be getting no help from him. James was, conviently, sorting the branches from largest to smallest and seemed to be avoiding Kaeson and Tock's confrontation with all his willpower.

Deciding to try diplomacy again, Kaeson looked Tock right in the eyes. If she was paying attention, she would see the yellow in his eyes slowly fade to a clear, ice blue. "Look, Tock -- we could do it, don't you think? We could fix -- uh, help, HELP, Cutty. After he finishes his job of course." Kaeson quickly added,"Don't you think he'd like that? To be healthy again?" Kaeson asked, and then looked at Cutty, "What about you? You wanna feel better?"