Professor Manabu Kinsho stood at a massive whiteboard, his wild mane of silver-streaked dark chestnut hair sticking out in every direction. His utility apron was stuffed with calipers, lenses, and small gears, and his dark brown eyes sparkled with manic intensity. He tapped a marker against his chin. In frantic concentration he calls out, "Asper! What were the readings again?"
Asper Pale rushed across the room, their slate-gray hair falling into their eyes. Their fingers twitched against their mechanical decryption wheel, the brass gears clicking in a nervous rhythm. They looked down at their clipboard, then at the dials on the engine.
"The Vapor-Vane Exhalers went from 1,959 plumes to 236 plumes," Asper called out, their voice carrying that rapid, breathless quality. "Spark Micro-Lightning went from 5,919 GND to 1,026 GND. Cipher-Light Indicators went from 19,214 Fulbites to 815 Fulbites. The Rumble-Core Overdrive went from 4,961 GGI to 0110 GGI. The Serpent's Pneumatic Coils went from 96-23 GG."
Jannali and Bianca exchanged a confused look, their voices dropping to whispers.
"What do you reckon they're talking about?" Jannali asked, her brow furrowed.
Bianca's eyes darted around the lab, and she replied in excited recognition. "Like, it looks like that thing. But like, I need to like get a closer look."
Jannali nodded. "What do you reckon—"
Both their heads snapped around when they heard Charlie's voice from inside the room.
He was standing at the whiteboard next to Professor Manabu Kinsho, his pith helmet now firmly in place. Professor Manabu Kinsho tapped the marker to his chin, muttering to himself.
"All of the readings went down. I would have assumed they would have spiked, considering the energy draw."
Charlie tapped the whiteboard, clearing his throat with a theatrical "Ahem!" In that pedantic, slightly nasal quality. "Have you considered that this correlation of symbols could be interpreted as consciousness and the physical vessel being directed across the spheres?"
Professor Manabu Kinsho shifted to where Charlie was pointing. His brow furrowed, his expression one of intense concentration. "And how did you come to that conclusion?"
Charlie straightened, preparing to launch into a lecture. "It is understandable how this arrangement of symbols can be misinterpreted. Allow me to elaborate."
He began to dissect the symbols on the whiteboard, his voice rising with scholarly authority. "Look at this," he pointed a finger. " The professor looked at this symbol and saw a blueprint for a generator. He saw a rotor, a chassis ground, and power struts. He thought like a mechanic. But he was completely blind to what was actually staring him in the face."
Charlie tapped the central point of the glyph.
"This isn't a machine schematic—it's a roadmap for cosmic ascent. Look at the geometry. This central dot right here? That's us. Amiso. The circle surrounding it is the Sun, and that crescent cradling the top is the Moon. They are all balanced perfectly on this cross, which represents the four elemental corners of the universe. It doesn't generate power; it's an astral lens designed to focus reality itself."
Charlie began to pace the chaotic, paper-strewn floor of the lab, gesturing wildly.
"When you lock this exact geometry into the matrix, the solitary stops being a drawing on a piece of metal. It turns into a living, stable transit vehicle. It is explicitly engineered to rip a physical body right out of our material plane, launch them straight up the vertical axis of the elements, and seamlessly shoot them across the celestial rings directly into the outer gates of reality."
Charlie stopped dead in his tracks, pointing a finger toward the now-silent engine.
Jannali and Bianca blinked in disbelief, their heads swiveling between Charlie and the whiteboard. They watched as Charlie dismantled the symbols with the confidence of a man who had spent a lifetime studying the arcane.
A loud crash echoed through the room. They turned to see Ember in the lab, attempting to pull a piece of paper out from under a pile of books. The tower of texts toppled, sending a cascade of ancient tomes and loose papers across the stone floor.
Jannali cursed under her breath. "Bloody hell."
Asper Pale's head whipped around from looking at the dial readings. Their voice carried a sharp, questioning edge. "Who are you?"
Ember paused, a sheepish grin spreading across her face. Her mismatched eyes blinked with feigned innocence.
Professor Manabu Kinsho paused, realizing he had been speaking with Charlie. His expression shifted from concentration to outrage. "What the hell are you doing?"
Jannali rolled her eyes, and Bianca shrugged as they both stepped into the lab. The light from the engine cast dancing shadows across their faces.
Professor Manabu Kinsho and Asper Pale spun to face them, their expressions a mixture of shock and indignation. The Professor's yelled out in panic. "What the hell is going on? Who are you people?"
He rushed toward a drawer, his hand reaching for the handle. But Jannali was faster. She intercepted him, her hand pressing against the drawer to block it.
"Relax, mate," Jannali said, her voice calm but firm. "We don't want any trouble. We just came here to have a yarn."
Bianca flicked her wrist, in a casual tone, as if this was a common occurrence, since, well it was. "Yeah, like chill or whatever. We are like here to figure stuff out, is all."
Asper ran across the room as Ember began to explore too much, her hands reaching for a delicate instrument. They called out, their voice sharp. "Hey! Don't touch that!"
Professor Manabu Kinsho straightened his back, his chin held high in defiant pride. "I will tell you nothing! I will not reveal the secrets of my work to the likes of the World Government! I saw what you did to this island's leader. It was despicable."
Jannali blinked at him, her expression one of genuine confusion. "Are you serious, mate? Do we look like we work for the World Government?"
Professor Manabu Kinsho's chin remained high, his dark brown eyes scanning them with suspicion. "You could be agents of some sort."
Bianca narrowed her eyes, insulted, "Like, no. Like absolutely not."
She walked to the whiteboard, her attention shifting to Charlie. "So like, what were you like saying about the like symbols and stuff?"
Charlie nodded, his expression one of scholarly enthusiasm. "Yes, of course. This is your field of expertise."
Professor Manabu Kinsho became exasperated, rushing back to the whiteboard to assert his authority. Bianca pointed at the numbers, her voice sharp.
"Like these numbers," she said, her finger tracing the readouts. "They like drop from the high operational numbers to like low baseline numbers. It like might look like 'power down,' but like it could also be like the machine locking a dimensional coordinate into place."
Charlie nodded, in agreement. "I can see it. But how would you explain—"
Professor Manabu Kinsho interrupted, his tone sharp. "Dimensional coordinate? How did you come to that conclusion?"
Bianca and Charlie exchanged a look. Bianca shrugged, in dismissive confidence. "Like, I have like seen something like this before."
Professor Manabu Kinsho's eyes lit up, but Bianca lifted a hand to stop him. "Its like a crazy long story, and like my friend is like missing, so like we can't get into all that right now."
Professor Manabu Kinsho cocked his head, his expression shifting to curiosity. "Missing?"
Jannali joined the conversation, her accent thick. "Yeah, nah, it was a blinding ripper of a flash, mate. All those God's Knights vanished with our mate, and there was a bloody massive power surge right from this spot."
Professor Manabu Kinsho's brow furrowed. "And how were you able to track the power surge?"
Charlie cleared his throat, about to answer, but Bianca cut him off. "Like, don't worry about it. We like know stuff, is all. And we need to like figure out if this thing is the reason our friend went missing. So like, we don't like want to be mean or anything, but like, don't get in the way or anything."
Professor Manabu Kinsho's jaw dropped. "Young lady, I will have you know that—"
Bianca flicked a wrist, ignoring him and returning her attention to Charlie and the whiteboard. "So like, I want to like get into the nuts and bolts and stuff, but like this looks like ancient tech."
Charlie nodded in scholarly agreement. "I concur with your assessment." He pointed at the whiteboard. "I suggest we—"
Professor Manabu Kinsho's head swiveled between them, his expression one of pure indignation. Jannali shrugged in casual dismissal. "Yeah, nah, might as well jump on the bandwagon. They're a fair bit ahead of the game, so keep up."
Professor Manabu Kinsho's jaw dropped as Charlie and Bianca dissected his work, their voices overlapping in a rapid-fire exchange of ideas and theories.
Across the room, Ember giggled as Asper Pale chased after her, their voice carrying a stream of insults and curses. The young woman darted between tables and bookshelves, her hands clutching a collection of tools she had confiscated.
"Give those back!" Asper called out, their voice rising with frustration. "They are precision instruments! They are not toys!"
Ember's laugh was a high-pitched, manic sound. "Finders keepers! Finders keepers!"
The laboratory hummed with the chaotic energy of two worlds colliding. The ancient engine crackled with static, casting dancing shadows across the walls. And in the center of it all, five unlikely allies began to unravel the secrets of the Celestial Transmutation Engine.
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