riverviewlogs | [Mostly Closed] August Catch-All

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[Mostly Closed] August Catch-All

who: Anyone that wants to interact with Ed during August (Hit me up to request a top level at

TransmutedSelf or post your own!)
what: Various
when: Anytime during August
where: Floor six, the Gardens, The General Store, Trixie and some nice burger joint in the city
warnings: Amnesia effects August 12th-19th, nightmares, religious talk etc. The nightmare thread has the potential to get pretty dark, warnings will go in individual tags.

Top-levels will be posted below.

Ed also has an open mingle posted if that's your thing.

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Keith looked a little confused for a second, listening as Ed talked like he was the mechanic.

"Oh, uh... well, I guess?" He shrugged. "I'm not a great mechanic for anything, really. That's definitely more Hunk or Pidge. I'd honestly be afraid of hurting him more than helping him if something came up that he needed help with fixing it." He frowned a bit. "Though, so far, we've been really lucky at how durable it is." Then again, it was made to battle with. It had to be durable.

"But, yeah... it's more just, I guess, helping him cope," he said. "He puts up a good front, but... Well, I've known him a long time. I can tell when something's off, and he's not feeling right. I just don't know how to help him through that." But Keith knew that Ed had a point. The events that resulted in them having prosthetic limbs were different for each of them. Though... Ed...

"Wait... you have more than one?" Okay, that was a little surprising.

"There are plenty of mechanics here, from what I've heard I wouldn't worry about it too much if that's not your thing." Honestly, he'd been surprised when Shiro mentioned trusting Keith with it, he wasn't one to judge a book by its cover but Keith hadn't struck him as the mechanic type, maybe because he wasn't a girl.

"He mentioned a mechanic back home, but she's not here clearly. He's going to need someone he can rely on if it does break down for any reason." He'd know all about that, but he doesn't go into details. "As durable as they are, even weapons malfunction." He knew the arm was made for battling, but automail was originally engineered as a weapon too, and his still shattered under pressure.

Ed took a sip of his drink, if only to give him a minute before speaking again. "Unfortunately, I can't really tell you how to help there. Everyone's different and you know him better than I do. I don't like to talk about mine much, my brother helps by massaging the ports when they ache sometimes, but- he's still thinking about getting my limbs back, and I know that's not an option anymore."

At the question he smirked, quirking a brow slightly. After a moment as if considering how to answer he offered a shrug, as if it was nothing at all. "One of my legs is also automail."

Keith furrowed his brow as he thought about that.

"Yeah," he agreed. He could see that point, definitely. "It's technology that, so far, only Pidge has been able to figure out. But yeah... we really do need to understand it better. I'm not sure Shiro even knows everything it can do."

Which, honestly, was kind of a scary thought, and made Keith a little nervous. He moved away from the thought for now.

"I figured as much," he said, referring to Ed's preference to avoid talking about it. "Shiro doesn't really like to talk about it, either." He also didn't remember a lot of how it happened, but bits and pieces were coming back to him over time. Keith didn't mention that, though.

His brain wrapped around two of those statements at the same time. First... leg. Okay. That he just nodded for a moment, because more than one, but clearly it wasn't his other arm. But... that other part.

"Your brother thinks you can get them back? How?"

"Considering we're dealing with other worlds here, it is entirely possible someone has more advanced technology than even Shiro's arm. It might be a piece of cake for them to help, if that's the case." The question would be how to shop around for such a mechanic without telling the whole moon about Shiro's arm, it wasn't something Ed planned on doing so he doubted if anyone else wanted to.

"There isn't really much you can do if he doesn't want to talk about it, sometimes that doesn't really help at all anyway. How much do you know about it? If the arm causes him pain or something, like automail does, checking in with him about that might help..." It might not, but it could be a lead into something for Keith if he used it right. "Just continuing to be supportive is about all you can do, I think."

At the last question his eyes widened slightly before he glanced away, fingers curling into a fist on the table, luckily not holding onto the mostly ignored can of soda there. "I don't know, it doesn't make any sense. I lost my arm saving Al, the only logical way to get it back would be to make the opposite exchange, which would be stupid... Maybe there are other options here, but I haven't seen any and even if there were-" A shrug, as if everything he'd just said about it being taxing on his body and possibly dangerous long term didn't matter. "Places like this it comes in handy."

"Yeah... if Shiro doesn't mind trying to ask around, but..." Well, Keith had noticed he'd started wearing a long sleeve jacket over it. It was one thing with them because they'd seen it right away when he got back to Earth, so he couldn't deny it. But here? He could see not wanting people to ask too many questions. "We'll have to see."

He considered the next part as well, thinking about what he knew other than the weapon part, and the fact that it was extremely durable. Shiro had used it as a shield even, blocking lasers and bladed weapons, and was able to take some hard hits on it. But how much more of that kind of abuse would it be able to take? Keith wasn't sure. "I don't know. It doesn't seem to, and I'm not sure that he'd really admit it right off if it did bother him in some way like that. I'll have to keep watch for it. He's gotten better at keeping things under wraps." Which, considering he had been in captivity and had been probably trying to keep them from seeing certain reactions or getting certain information, Keith could understand why he'd gotten good at keeping secrets.

He did flinch a little at Ed's reaction to the question, wondering if he'd gone too far, and almost offered to 'take it back' if Ed didn't want to answer, but he started speaking before Keith could. He frowned a bit at the nonchalant ending to the whole thing.

"How did you make the blade? Is it in the arm?"

"I can point him to the guy I spoke to, but Shiro's arm is way more advanced than mine. Even if it's something he can handle, it might not be something he's equipped for yet. He hasn't set up shop, so even I still need to be careful about not doing any damage." Things like hunting down unknown dieties? Yeah, not a smart move when it's possible there's no replacement for lost limbs around here, yet.

"You'd probably notice if it did, he might be more stiff in the rain." He didn't get the feeling from talking to Shiro that it was an issue, but it was definitely something to look out for. Not that he'd normally condone anyone butting into someone else's business, but if Keith wanted to help he'd have to know the signs.

He glanced back at Keith with the question, for a moment looking completely oblivious as if he wasn't aware that his arm could become a blade. Mostly he's confused that anyone would think the blade was just part of the arm, but different worlds, different tech and all that. Right.

"It's alchemy. I'm sure you've seen me transmute enough by now to get an idea how that works." He claps, things move. Ed tugged his sleeve back to reveal the metal plating of his arm, "By thinning the metal here I can transmute this part of my arm out into a blade. It's not the automail, I can do it with basically anything." Basically anything, meaning not flesh and blood.

"Yeah. Or potentially making things worse with a bad repair." Sometimes, if a person didn't know enough about what they were doing, they would only make things worse than actually fixing them. They had to be careful of that, too, or lose use of the limb altogether.

He nodded about the rain thing, but tried to remember if that had been an issue. They hadn't been exposed to much in the way of weird weather back home because they spent most of their time on the ship. It hadn't really been something he'd gotten the chance to observe. He'd have to watch out for anything here.

"Kind of..." Keith leaned in to look a little closer when Ed pulled his sleeve up. "Though, doesn't thinning the metal like that weaken it to impact?" It wasn't like the bayards at all, though, if that's what Ed was doing. The bayards were complete weapons, using Altean particle storage technology to make themselves smaller and then to essentially disappear into the Paladin armor.

"I'm lucky I guess, technology is so advanced here what I have going on seems like a piece of cake." As long as there was no damage to the port, because that was oddly advanced for anyone else in this place.

His lips press together at the question, as if unsure how to answer it before shrugging. "Automail is pretty strong, and I have the best there is. I've used my arm to crush someone else's and it's managed all these years without an issue." It did remind Ed of all the times Winry told him to stop messing with her automail though, like using alchemy on it might mess it up fundamentally. He didn't like to think about that.

"That's good, at least. Maybe we'll be lucky like that for Shiro's arm, too." Granted, Shiro's had that outer casing that Keith had never seen inside the actual device, and it had several other features, like data storage and the weaponized hand, so it was probably pretty complicated, even for an advanced group of people. But it was worth asking around just in case. Keith didn't want to be stuck in a position where they were trying to find someone to fix it after it was damaged.

He considered Ed's comment about automail being strong. He had seen Shiro take some pretty brutal hits on his own arm, so he knew the Galra tech used was really durable. He nodded.

"Yeah, I guess so. Makes sense." A beat. "If you're secure in it, then no reason not to use it to your advantage, right?" Like Shiro turning a Galra weapon against the people who made it. They had forced it on him and he was stuck with it, but he made the best of it all the same. He got up from the table.

"Thanks. I know it probably isn't easy to talk about, so I appreciate you answering my questions."

Unfortunately, that was out of Ed's experience level but he nodded at the thought. It would be nice, if Shiro was lucky enough to find someone that knew what they were doing, with the various places and timelines it was hard to tell who had the most advanced tech around here. One thing about Purg was the way it equalized everyone, it didn't matter who was a space pilot and who had never seen a phone before, none of that technology existed in Purg. Which is why knowing space pilots hadn't even been a consideration in Ed's previous friendships, it wasn't something that came up a lot.

"Right." Using circumstances to his advantage was something Ed was very good at. At the thanks he just waved a hand dismissively. "No problem, anytime you need anything else, just let me know." A pause. "You might want to talk to Al, too. If anyone can relate from your side of things, it'd be him." Sure, the relationship wasn't exactly the same but he knew Keith was worried about Shiro the way Alphonse worried about his automail. "I'm sure he won't mind."

Keith nodded at the offer.

"Al... we met shortly after I arrived. He's your brother, right?"

They looked similar enough, after all.

"Yeah, he is. He lives on the floor here too, so he should be easy to find."

"Thanks. I'll keep it in mind."

Keith gave Ed a weak smile.

"I should get going."

He got up from the table.

"I appreciate everything."

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[Mostly Closed] August Catch-All

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