As the old saying goes, "knowledge is power," and nowhere is it more obviously so than in your line of work- wizardry is reliant on understanding everything you can about what you're effecting with it. You point out as much, and add that the data acquisition utilities are well-documented.
Nita nods absently. "That's a good point. We could've done major damage as well, had we tried to act without enough knowledge; and you were doing preliminary research at best."
Rhiow flicks her tail slightly in annoyance, before bringing you back to a different point. "As important as information is, it is a moot point if you have nowhere to live. Any ideas at all?"
You're not really coming up with anything, but… "Well, we helped Taylor out; maybe when her dad gets back we can ask them about someplace…"
Your feline ally apparently thinks that sufficient, as her tail twitches in agreement. "It's better than nothing, I suppose." She stands, and continues, "I'm going to go and prepare the gate to be moved; even if we're not ready to move it yet, natural mooring structures require modification before they can be manipulated to any significant degree." With that, she mutters something and walks through the nearest wall.
You look at the spot in the wall that the cat walked through, slightly bemused. Consideration of what she's going to do, however, brings to mind thoughts of home.
"Well, we'd best take a look at that spell," you say, brushing them aside. You're not quite ready to contemplate that, yet.
"Right. Going to have to see what we-"
Nita is interrupted by the sound of a door opening frantically- the back door, if you're correct. A male voice rings out.
"Taylor, are you here?"
Oh dear. You glance at Nita, and are met with her gaze. You close your manuals and store them in your personal claudications, and as you go towards him, you hear Taylor greeting him.
About fifteen minutes later, you pull your manuals out again, and look back on what just happened as you flip to the page containing the data-acquisition spell.
When Taylor's father had gotten home (one Daniel Hebert, you had learned), he had been panicked- and rightfully so. The school had called him about the locker, and apparently he had headed there, and then immediately home(meaning that they had taken hours to call Taylor's father about her absence and ruined locker. Your already low regard for that school dropped even further when you realized this).
Taylor had told him what had happened, and introduced the two of you to him as "The people who got me out of the locker." He seemed slightly bemused at this, but she then asked you if she could talk to him alone for a little bit, and you and Nita did so, going to a different room.
You reach the point in the manual that describes the spell, and a pit settles in your stomach. The spell isn't complex, per se. It does, however, require lots of information on data structures, coding languages, radio frequencies, and so forth- an amount that makes sense, considering that you have to build a parser for each source of data that you want the manual to acquire.
You hear Nita sigh in frustration beside you, and can't help but agree with her. If you're lucky, the local versions could be similar to the ones in your home universe, and you could use the examples in your manuals as a base. More likely than not, though, you're going to have to do a lot of the work from scratch. Between gathering information, building the interpreters, and bug-checking them to make sure your information was valid, it could take-
Nita, likely noticing your increasing anxiety, interrupts your thoughts. "Bobo should be able to build the data interpreting modules, though we'll still have to do the bug-testing. That should save us some time, at least. Gathering the information he'll need will still take a while, though."
Oh, right. She has the Peridexis of Wizardry in her head. A while is right, though. Assuming that you can gather the information required as easily as you could using the internet in your home universe, if you spend between 8 and 16 hours per day gathering the required information and double-checking it, you should have enough for 'Bobo' to build the parser within two to three weeks. The bug testing will likely take a while on its own. Thankfully, the central data input utility (and 'giggle' sorting routine, should you need to initialize a local version) are relatively simple, though you'll need an accurate external clock and constant, non-negligible power source for the input utility.
With that amount of time, you realize, there's a decent chance that you could be endangered by the area. Perhaps you should consider a 'cape' persona, just in case. Creating a costume wouldn't even be difficult; the most popular clothing-transmutation spell in the manual has a design-aiding system that provides full outfit stability, if you want to go all-out, character-wise. Before you can actually voice your considerations on this, however, you hear Taylor calling you back out to the main room. You close and stash your Manuals, and head back out.
When you step into the room, you note that Mr. Hebert seems less bewildered than he had been earlier. He thanks you profusely, and asks you a few questions- who you are, where you're staying, that sort of thing. You introduce yourselves(minus Rhiow, of course; she's still out), and use the opportunity to ask him about housing.
"Actually, we don't have anywhere to stay at the moment. We should be able to get enough money to rent a place before to long, but could you help us find somewhere to stay until then?" You ask.
"Well, you could stay here for a bit. You did help Taylor out of a tight situation," he replies.
While his offer is nice, you definitely need a base of operation. You tell him as much, emphasizing that you have a few projects that are absolutely vital. He seems somewhat unhappy about this, but folds somewhat quickly.
"If you need a low-cost place, your best bet would probably be something in the Docks. It wouldn't be a real nice place, and there's no guarantee that you'd get furniture, but you should have running water and electricity available."
You thank him, and he thanks you again. You hear him talking on the phone, and are getting ready to return to the library to start on more research, but before you can go he hangs back up and asks you and Nita if you could come with him; apparently he's going to talk to that school's principal about this, and since you were the ones to let Taylor out, you might know something that could help his case.
[ ] Go with him.
[ ] Don't go with him.
[ ] Write-In.
The area you're in is a dangerous one; you could very well be robbed or worse, and it's only a matter of time before you run into one of the local 'supervillains'. For this reason, perhaps you should practice a wizardry for use in combat situations. The 'elemental' dueling spell would be a good one; it's relatively efficient and is handy in combat situations; even better, it would fit right in with the local 'superpowers'. You also remember reading about a 'persistent utility' system a little while back; essentially, it keeps its inbuilt wizardry 'idling,' able to be instantly run multiple times. It has a constant energy drain while active, but it could still be handy, especially the one used for the initial test runs- a tap-to-sleep wand. Alternately, you are a Wizard. Surely other battle-usage wizardries exist in the manual.
Of course, the time practicing(with mental practice of the spell's matrix at least once a day, and actual practice of the spell itself at least once a week) is time you could use for many other things. You'll be mostly staying to yourself, anyways, and even if anything does come up, you could find something in your manual if need be.
[ ] Will you practice a spell? If so, which one? (Write-In)
Mr. Hebert's offer is a great one, but between the worldgate and the data acquisition wizardry, you'll need a place to keep your projects. You'll also need to eat, and will need to get a simple plug-in clock or server(as well as electricity for said device) to hook into the acquisition utility. Unfortunately, you can't exactly get a standard job; you have no local identity, after all. You suppose you could play 'rogue' and use your Art as a 'cape power', doing various powered odd-jobs.
Of course, there are always other options; maybe Nita, Rhiow, or your hosts have an idea.
[ ] How will you pay for the things you need? (Write In)
