jumped without a jump drive

[rockeye_stonetoe]

Nick, in a full environment suit like any sensible person would wear in untamed wilderness, is overseeing a small swarm of robots harvesting various useful plantlife from the uninhabited parts of a sparsely settled planet, when something suddenly comes tearing through the undergrowth towards him and it's not showing up on scanners-

He raises his hand-phaser, notices it has a mirror for a face and hesitates a little too long. And then he is in a clearing, cut off from his ship and 'bots, with all available sources of data telling him he just went through a jump.

What.

Comments

[rockeye_stonetoe]

"I think I'll be alright. I might mess up idioms and turns-of-phrase, but I have the basics. Thank you for your help."

[segreant]

"You're welcome."

[rockeye_stonetoe]

"Oh, I almost forgot, you were going to test a piece of my armor! Let's do that before I forget again."

[segreant]

"Sure. And you probably want to get... something... else... to wear."

[rockeye_stonetoe]

...He buys a set of cheap generic clothes- pants, shirt, decent quality boots- for as few coppers as he can get them. These get folded up under one arm.

Then he follows Kaja back to the paladin compound, removing some sections of plate from underneath the outer layers of the suit along the way.

[segreant]

And Kaja fetches her swordstaff, and awaits a piece of armor.

[rockeye_stonetoe]

"I'm not sure I want to be holding it when you try this, you're likely to knock me over. I'll prop it against a wall?"

[segreant]

"On the ground. We like our walls."

[rockeye_stonetoe]

He sets a forearm-guard, a shoulderpad, and a breastplate on the ground.

[segreant]

Kaja fetches her swordstaff, stands at a reasonable distance from the objects, and brings the weapon over her head and down onto the breastplate with an earsplitting clong.

There's a dent, but it doesn't break.

"Nice stuff," she says.

[rockeye_stonetoe]

He fetches the armor. "It's resistant to fire, by the way, in that it won't let heat pass through it as easily as steel. I can make more, with a few days' warning and some coin for the materials. Would the Bright Sister be interested?"

[segreant]

"Let me see how it takes a blessing," says Kaja, "before I spend her time on finding out." She picks up the armguard. "If you don't mind?"

[rockeye_stonetoe]

"I don't mind."

[segreant]

So Kaja holds the armguard between her hands. "Winter Light, to safeguard your agents from violence and to better serve you, I ask that you grant some small part of your strength to this armor, to protect whichever of our sisters and brothers in your service may have cause to wear it. In your name let it be blessed."

The armor glows a little bit.

"Not as good as fresh steel," she says. "But that might be entirely because you've worn it and you're not a paladin. It'll break if you wear it again, incidentally. And it wasn't bad, and it does start stronger than steel. I bet Bright Sister would like to put paladins in suits of this."

[rockeye_stonetoe]

"...I hadn't expected it to become unusable to me. I wish you'd warned me. Well, in a few days I can replace it and have you bless a fresh piece and see if it turns out better. I still expect to make communication devices for the Order, which will take longer than armor, and I would like to know which to try for first."

[segreant]

"No, the blessing will break, the material will be fine."

[rockeye_stonetoe]

"Oh. Shall I loiter and begin repairing it while you inform the Bright Sister of this and ask for her judgment on communication devices and armor?"

[segreant]

"Yes. I'll be right back."

[rockeye_stonetoe]

So he loiters and applies tools to his armor. It'll never be quite as strong again because the inner layers will be ruptured, but once it's at least in the correct shape he re-inserts it into the suit.

[segreant]

Kaja comes back. "Sister wants the communication things first."

[rockeye_stonetoe]

"Then I will make communication things first. The easiest communication things involve running wires to the places you want to communicate with, but I'll just skip straight to wireless kinds. Expect it to take at least two weeks, and there will be chores to keep them working."

[segreant]

"What kind of chores?"

[rockeye_stonetoe]

"Changing drained batteries for fresh ones, keeping a fire under a generator that produces the electricity they need and stores it in batteries, managing the way they are linked together if you add more."

[segreant]

"That doesn't sound so bad."

[rockeye_stonetoe]

"I can go over it in more detail when I actually have some communication things to present. For now, I'd better get to work. Have a nice couple of weeks!"

And he goes and finds that moneylender's grandson and explains the 'hiring him' condition on the loan, hires him, and sees about getting raw materials and a workspace.

Four days later he has a miniature generator on wheels that will take heat from a woodstove under it, and a long string of electric lights. He rents a wagon and drapes it in brilliant light and drives it around the city to advertise this new product.