Chase Stein (one_up) wrote in devolve2, @ 2011-04-23 18:15:00 |
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Entry tags: | chase_stein, tony_stark |
Tony - Backdated to Monday April 18th
Chase was nervous. He couldn’t help it. Yeah the world was in shambles, he’d just basically fought for survival the last two years of his life. He was not the same loudmouth cocky kid he’d been before. Okay, he was still a cocky loudmouth. But this was not a situation where he felt overconfident.
He was meeting Tony-fucking-Stark, the Iron Man, in his lab. Which was awesome. And terrifying at the same time. Because it echoed the sentiment of him not being smart enough, not being good enough, for Stark to waste his time on him. With his peers, he had no doubts, there was nobody else his own age as good with machines as he was. But this was a different scenario entirely and that old fear of not measuring up was rearing its ugly head.
That and he’d be mortified if he came off like some stupid fanboy. So yeah, game face totally on.
Standing outside the lab, he didn’t bother with the call button. He was too busy fidgeting with his hands anyway. “Mr. Stark?” he said, his powers automatically compensating to nudge the intercom from its standby mode. Communication devices were the only thing he could activate with his powers, and they had to be in a standby mode of some sort. Still, nobody did hands free chatting like he did. “It’s Chase.”
That didn’t sound too dorky, did it?
Tony didn’t look up from the circuit board he’d been working on. He didn’t need to in order to respond. He’d built the intercom, after all, and Jarvis was on door duty. He, on the other hand, had a few chips to replace if he wanted to rescue this particular piece from the junk pile.
“Come on in!” he called. “Jarvis? Door please.”
The door swung open just as Tony finished the solder on one chip.
“Don’t mind the arm there,” he told Chase as one of the robot arms reacted to the door by swinging around. “He’s sensitive.” Motion sensitive. It was useful. Sometimes.
Chase stepped in and just stopped. Because...wow. The robotic arm caught his attention as it swung around towards him, but not for that reason. “Yeah, it just said...that,” he muttered. Okay, his composure was completely blown. Partially because of the whole wow factor of the tech in here and partially because the noise level of this many advanced machines was momentary deafening to the technopath. Yeah power off. At least for now.
Shaking his head as the cacophony in his head died down when he shut down his powers, he rolled his shoulders and started towards Tony. A million questions whirred through his head and he settled on possibly the most obvious one. “What’re you working on?” he asked curiously.
Which probably shouldn’t have come before hello, but Chase was a gearhead first and it was probably awesome, whatever it was.
Tony could appreciate that. He was far more interested in his work than in pleasantries. He held up the board for Chase to see. “It’s from one of the cars we haven’t been able to get running. I’m starting from scratch with it to convert it to electric so we can charge it off the reactor instead of using gas.
He put down the board and looked up at Chase. “Grab a stool and sit down.”
Behind them Tony had a computer running some diagrams for the new engines he’d been designing, as well as a few other programs on different screens, scrolling through code and data logs. There was a disassembled engine nearby, everything arranged according to Tony’s own method.
Okay, now they were talking. Chase had already converted his van to biodiesel, mostly because the electric conversion would have taken too long. But both petrol and biodiesel were at the end of their shelf lives, which meant alternative fuel sources were needed. Charging it off the arc reactor definitely caught his attention.
Grabbing a stool, he started looking over the parts laid out and the diagrams. “So is the issue making a cell that can contain the energy,” because his dim understanding of the arc reactor was it was basically limitless in its power. “that’s large enough to hold the amount you need but still small enough to fit in the car, or something else?” That would be his first guess for issues. Then there would be sustaining the charge over time period. From what he’d gathered, the teams were out all day, which meant you needed at least a 12 hour charge. No commericial car engine at the time the world went to hell could do that on electric alone.
“It’s both,” Tony told him. “Though I think I’ve got the charge issue figured out. Waiting on some parts for that one. We’ve got a lot here but well, sometimes what we’ve got isn’t what I need.”
He went back to the board, working on it while he talked.
“If it works, it’ll recharge itself to a point, so that’ll be nice, won’t it? Size-wise, well. That’s a trick, but again, supplies. It’s always supplies around here.” Tony shook his head. “There was a time when I could just have Jarvis order whatever I needed. That was great, wasn’t it?” he asked, glancing back at one of his screens.
“Yes, sir,” said a quiet voice with a British accent. “Very convenient.”
Chase frowned and nodded. “Can you give the teams an idea what you need?” he asked. “Or send Kitty or Paige out for it?” As far as he knew, they both went out, but his understanding of the teams wasn’t the best. He had just gotten there, after all. “Or is it something that isn’t even out there?” That was a possibility as well. If it was something that didn’t exist or was hard to find unless you knew where to look. Yeah...that would be tough.
What he didn’t expect was Jarvis’ reply. He startled a bit, looking around then shook his head at himself. “Sorry, not used to them actually talking,” he muttered. Okay, head back in game. “That would be more convenient.”
“Oh, it’s all out there. Made a list,” Tony told him as he finished up with the circuit board and took it over to one of the computers to hook it up for a test. “The trick is finding enough. It’s no good to make a prototype if I can’t make a bunch more if the prototype works. So, I might have to make some... adjustments.” Or redesign the whole thing based on what the teams managed to bring back in. It was a crap shoot but Tony was coping with that. Not always gracefully, but hey, who expected him to be graceful.
“So, tell me what your skills are,” he told Chase once the board was hooked up and diagnostics had started running. “We’ve got plenty of repair work.”
“Do they know where to look?” he asked, which was probably a dumb question, but it was the first thing that popped to mind. Chase nodded. “Like you said, it’s always supplies.” Somehow he doubted any of the bodge it together tricks would work here.
“I’m great with repairs,” he told Tony. “I can generally get the machine to just tell me what’s wrong. So long as I understand what the malfunction is, I can fix it. Well, since its actually an issue here, I can fix it so long as I have the parts.” He shrugged. “Same with operating a machine. Unless there’s security protocols in the way, I can use ask it how it functions and go from there. I’m good with mechanics, hydraulics, electronics and robotics.”
Tony nodded, mentally checking Chase’s skills against his list of things that needed attention. The colony and the humans on the farm were so very dependant on the technology and machinery that kept things running, from defenses to vehicles and maintenance. And it all needed looking after by someone.
After thinking for a moment Tony turned to one of his computers for a quick silent chat with Jarvis and a few of his files. He quickly updated Chase in Jarvis’ security profiles, giving him access to the workshop.
“Right, so, I think for the moment we need you on repairs. The farms need a whole bunch of their machinery checked over so they can stay on schedule for a fall harvest. Ideally, I’d love to get all their stuff onto bio-diesel at least but I’m not stupid enough to think that’ll happen this year. Do me a favor, let me know if their stuff’s up to the challenge once it’s not immediately necessary. Oh, and introduce yourself to Jarvis. He’ll let you in here once he’s got a good voice print.”
Chase nodded, pulling his attention away from the engine plans. “Yeah, I can definitely do that,” he agreed. “That’s always a possibility until you work out the parts issue for the electric engines. Convert all of the vehicles to bio-diesel. Unless they already have been.”
Shaking his head at himself. “But yeah, I can definitely do that,” he amended. He looked around for a second then added. “Hello, Jarvis?” This was so weird. A machine everybody else could to talk to and hear.
“Hello Mr. Stein,” said the British voice. “You have been added to the list of people with access to the workshop and some of the supply rooms.”
“I keep the door open a lot,” Tony added. “The supply rooms are sorted and catalogued. Jarvis talks out loud in here. He’s pretty quiet though. I programmed a butler, you know? Then he turned British. He’ll let you know if you’re touching something you shouldn’t or using supplies I need. And he’ll let me know too. Otherwise, just forget he’s there.”
Tony reached back to unplug the circuit board when the diagnostics finished. “Right now you’ve got limited access. We’ll see how you do. Don’t break anything and we’ll see about playing with the fun toys.”
Chase winced as Jarvis addressed him. “Chase is good,” he assured the AI. It kind of disturbed him. He laughed at Tony’s revelation. “And people don’t believe when I tell them all machines have minds their own. And yeah, no problem.”
He nodded. “Will do,” he said, offering Tony a mock salute. “Right now I want to go have a chat with the farm equipment. Find out what kind of shape its in, that kind of thing.”
God, playing with the fun toys. Chase was damned well going to not break anything. “Thanks, Mr. Stark.” It was an absent sort of afterthought as he was already heading for the door. He’d never worked on farm equipment before, so it was better he had a basic idea what he was dealing with before he got into making any changes. “Later.”
“I don’t know about machines,” Tony told Chase as he prodded at a new circuit board. “Jarvis is all code. Probably why he’s so superior all the time. Call me Tony and let me know if anything on the farm is shot to hell. I’ll be here.”
“Yessir,” Chase replied, pausing at the door. “I mean Tony. And for what it’s worth, it’s been really nice to meet you.” Okay, that was as close to fanboy as he was getting. Now, onto the tractors. And whatever else was farm equipment.