Fifty Shades of Gunmetal

[tempus_fixit]

[Lucca's been especially scarce during the stinkbomb incident, content to work outdoors where the smell was... lessened. But now she has a reason to be searching the city and the rooms of the Deeps in particular.]

[Video]

My books are missing! The entire library is GONE! Ohhh gosh, if I don't find them soon... If, if anyone finds any books on robotics, circuitry, solid-state engineering or magiteck, can you bring 'em over? Please!?

[She sounds a little panicked. Everyone has their mote of security, and it seems that was hers. The books are scattered EVERYWHERE, tucked in planters, up trees, in bathrooms, being held by statues, in decorative tureens in the palace district, in coiled ropes down near the docks...]

[Also of note the drier texts are sometimes paired up with some interesting companions. Things bearing titles like "Tangled Pistons of Passion", and "Lust and Superfluids: No Resistance to the Heat." Oh my.]

Comments

[just_some_meddler]

[Ciel answers the door. Her apartment is just as disheveled as everyone else's is right now.]

Hi. Here's your book.

[tempus_fixit]

Thanks. [She clutches the book to her and looks past Ciel through the doorway.]

Oh... he got to you too, huh?

[just_some_meddler]

Yeah. Found your book by bumping a bookcase and having it land on my head.

I swear I'm normally not that clumsy.

[tempus_fixit]

[She giggles a little.]

That's okay, that's how I find most of mine! [Is she serious? Maybe.]

[just_some_meddler]

Well that explains the helmet, doesn't it?

[tempus_fixit]

That's not... the only reason. It's also an extensive system of sensors and signal relays with an integrated display that relays strengths and weaknesses of my targets and enemies!

Cranial defense from falling objects is a bonus.

[just_some_meddler]

I can see why you might want something like that with that monkey running around. The thought of some guy sneaking around and digging through my stuff? Creepy!

[tempus_fixit]

The problem is, I couldn't even pick up on him. He's got to be pretty sneaky to avoid my scanner!

[just_some_meddler]

I caught a glimpse of SOMETHING while I was searching. It might have been his tail.

Or it might have been a cat. It was far away.