♜ Stone and Dagger ♜ [w/Percy]

“Something fell out of it!” a voice rang over the torrential rush of the storm to a team of people scurrying around a beached boat. “Hurry! We have to get to these coordinates,” Perseus Dagger emphasized as he lowered a tool from his eye and shoved a piece of paper with a hastily scrawled bunch of numbers on it into the captain’s hands.

“Sir, it’s a bit dangerous..” one of the team lightly protested, to which Percy only grinned and clapped him on the back. “No risk, no reward, Parsons! I’ve been tracking dimensional anomalies for years, and this is the first time I’ve gotten to one in time to not only witness it, but get a hold of what comes out of one. Hurry, hurry, everyone!” the science nerd urged, pulling his raincoat’s hood over his two-toned head a bit more as he rushed onto the boat.

Percy had his hands in many technological projects. More generally, he adored all things science. Normally this applied more to the tech side, but technology could be applied to nearly every field of study, from the more science fiction to practical medicine. He had no idea the two would meet today, though. The youngest Dagger son had invented a device that continually scanned the magnetic forces around Earthland, occasionally detecting a change. Normally it looked as if black holes formed within the ozone of their planet, closing as quickly as they opened. He suspected wormholes existed, either naturally or magically made. While inter-dimensional travel was a draw on its own, Percy was more interested in the magical element. If someone could rip holes in space and time to move things around, perhaps such a being could bestow magic on someone? No matter the vast discovers and breakthroughs he made in the world of science, magic would always be at the forefront of his one-track mind.

This particular disturbance picked up by the device crackled for a long time before it opened over a lake in the middle of Sakuramori. The forrest was very familiar to him. He’d spent a lot of time researching in the strange environment filled with magic and spirits. While it did usually have his allergies in a whirl by the end, he cared not. His team rushed right to the indicated site by lacricopter towing a high-powered boat, both of his own design to function no matter the weather.

Even if his research team was wary of their boss’s slightly reckless enthusiasm, they were ever obedient to the influential Dagger family and dared not throw their livelihoods away to resist. Percy would never have treated them this way, but they weren’t used to the unusually soft nature of the youngest sibling. The boat sliced through the choppy waters like a hot knife through butter, using a mix of smart design and bottom weights to stay perfectly stable. All eyes scanned for something foreign in the water, but it was so choppy and dark from the storm that Percy feared it’d been lost. “Quick, someone get me some thermal nocs,” commanded the head of research, holding out a hand expectantly. The lenses appeared in his hand within an instant and he gave the area another scan, then gave an uncharacteristically loud whoop. “THERE IT IS!” he cried, pointing in the appropriate direction so the captain could steer that way. The more he looked at the orange and red shape bobbing in the water, the more his brows creased in thought. “Or...should I say...he rather than it,” he mildly corrected himself. It was clearly a humanoid shape, and given the build it was traditionally male. It might have been a hasty assumption given that it’d just popped out of a wormhole from lord knows where, but he’d edit himself later after further observation.

As they pulled up to the struggling man, it seemed either the relief of being saved or his condition robbed him of his consciousness. Just like that Percy snapped from the curious researcher to someone with medical experience. Blood mixed with the rainwater in the floor of the boat, turning it pink quickly. “He’s injured pretty badly. Emma!” A girl emerged from the cabin below in a white coat, carrying a hefty medical bag. “The worst is his arm— Er, the lack of a-arm...” His eyes trailed to the stump and he felt his stomach do a little flip. Sympathetic pain in his own arm throbbed sharply, and the amount of blood gave him just a moment’s pause. He was medically trained enough to handle this, but he had never been an emergency surgeon. The traumatic nature of the injury and the pressure were things Percy had never been the best with, but within seconds he switched to mind over matter. He knew what he had to do. “HURRY! Back to shore, we have to get him into the copter and back to Dagger Corp. Emma, on the way help me curb the bleeding and preserve the nerve endings,” he commanded, getting right to work. If he could save these nerves, he already had an idea of what he could do for this man.

Within a half hour they were back at Dagger Corp and the mysterious portal man was in a state-of-the-art hospital room. While the company wasn’t a hospital and didn’t do much in the way of rescue care or even general medicine for the masses, they did quite a number of experimental surgeries, usually offering trials for specified scenarios. While the trial testing out the new artificial limbs hadn’t started yet, it was close enough. This man was too prime a candidate for his high-tech prosthetic to pass up the opportunity.

Once scrubbed in, he and a medical team went to work installing the base connector to the stump, effectively taking care of the wound and preserving the nerves needed to work the cybernetic arm. Overall, the whole team was surprised by how nearly identical the man’s physiology was to an Earthland human. If there were any huge differences, they couldn’t discern them while doing surgery on the remaining part of the arm. It was a mystery how he’d received the handicap, but it was a very clean cut. Too clean. Presumably some sort of blade? A casualty from the wormhole? They all had so many questions. Was he even from another dimension, or maybe another time? The questions would never end, but the surgery would quickly. It was a success! His other cuts and bruises were cared for, then he was left to rest and recover.

Some time later, Percy returned to the room with the replacement arm. It looked robotic with its bright metal and black silicone in the joints and covering the digits, but still had the proportions of an average human arm. One day the Dagger scientist hoped to make a skin-like cover for the prosthetic that would make it look real, but as it was, it should function nearly exactly like a normal limb, minus the tense of touch. Installing touch receptors into the silicone was the next thing he planned to work on. Leaving the arm on a table across the room, Percy approached to check the skin around the connector, then started attaching wires into the base that would serve as the new “nerves” for the new arm.

The two toned young man’s mismatched eyes glanced over at the scarred face of the man for what seemed like the hundredth time since they fished him out of the lake. Something about the man kept drawing his eye...and it was making him uncomfortable.

[wc: 1265 || Percy’s Total: 1265 || Group Total: 2471]

It was a shock how quickly things went sideways. One moment he was glancing over the stranger between work on the wiring at the stump, the next the base and its wires were jerked from his grip and sight. He jumped off his stool and staggered back a couple steps, watching his patient stagger out of bed and thrash about. "H-HEY!" he started dumbly, wanting to tell him to calm down and stop ripping all the IVs and such out, but nothing more came. The mysterious man from another world was fraught with panic, as was Percy more by the second. Had the sedatives wore off so soon? This was the price he'd pay for not fully knowing the physiology of his patient.

Maybe this had been an unwise decision.

Percy had been just about to open his mouth to try and calm him when a flash of skin launched at him. vaulting over the bed and slammed him with enough force that he smacked down onto the cold hard tile. Wheezing some air back into his lungs, mismatched eyes widely stared up at him as he loomed. Too startled to put up a fight, Percy should have used the second or two granted to him by the dawning realization that the limb his patient wished to use was missing, but instead he chose to basically remain there. He scooted back a little, holding up a hand meant to calm the bewildered man. "Y-You're saf--" he tried to get out, but it was too late once more. The remaining left hand grabbed him up like he weighed nothing more than a ragdoll in a child's grip. That was quite a testament, seeing how Percy was no lightweight with his well-trained muscles and the attacker only had one arm. Never before had Percy been lifted so high by the collar nor slammed so hard into a wall, so once again he was groaning and left gasping for air. One hand gripped the wrist of the spooked male's arm wrist, the other pushed defensively at his bare chest. Muscles twitched with effort under his fingers, and leave it to Percy to manage to admire this despite the threatening nature. He was a fine specimen indeed. Percy knew at least three martial arts moves that would get him out of his position, but his science brain was on. Fighting back might injure the other man further, or even jeopardize the surgery on the stump. Plus, any hope of keeping him here to finish required him to think with his head and not with his might.

Despite this dire situation that had Percy reeling, he felt a wash of relief as he heard language he understood pass from his aggressor's lips. At least he knew they could communicate, something he hadn't considered until now. How much worse off would they be if there was a language barrier to complicate it further? "P-Perseus D-D-Dagger," he responded to the first command, eyes still wide as they stared into the dark ones near his face. He was almost afraid to blink. "You're in D-Dagger Corps' medical ward. Y-your arm was missing when we found you!" the younger Dagger male assured him, mistaking the question for an accusation that he had been responsible for the loss of limb. He had no idea what this man remembered before he landed in the lake. "S-See? I s-saved the nerve endings in your upper arm...for a p-prosthetic replacement." The scientist patted his chest toward the right arm. Even though the wires were a bit wonky from being jerked out of his hands, the base still remained attached to his arm and nerves. Maybe he'd take a look and see it wasn't hurting him. In fact, it wasn't bleeding and probably didn't hurt too much. The Dagger's medical skills and access to cold fusion post-surgery treatments made wounds heal absurdly fast.

As time ticked on with Percy still in his precarious position, he started to squirm a little in the strong man's grip, his own pain from being slammed and held there starting to wear on him. Even so, he couldn't help but notice how close this muscular man was to him. He was...a nice-looking guy. Something about that and his magnificent show of force had his heart racing now, not entirely out of danger, but also...attraction? No, that couldn't be right. Percy wasn't into that...was he? He had been spending a lot of time looking at his face and body... Now the hand placed on the other man's chest seemed awkward. Cheeks flushed brighter and brighter, spreading from ear to ear the longer he was pinned to the wall. "I...I'm just trying to help..." he nearly whimpered, turning his eyes off to the side.

[wc: 793 || Percy's total: 2058 || Thread Total: 4179]

Percy heaved a small, quivering sigh of relief as it seemed his explanations were accepted. He was rewarded by being placed back down on his feet, which almost seemed to reject his weight for a moment. He sagged back against the wall for just a second before he regained himself, seeming a bit shaken but growing stronger by the minute. The Dagger male was no weakling, but he'd been caught off guard in more ways than one.

As the taller, stronger male apologized, Percy managed a lop-sided smile and shook his head. "N-No, please, I was the one who wasn't prepared to properly interact with someone not from this world. I hadn't expected you to wake so soon," he assured the man, still not moving as if motion would set the stranger into action again. Instead, introductions were made. Dagda from the planet Tetsukasu. The nerd in Percy bristled with excitement. He was meeting a man from another planet, an extraterrestrial. So many theories and dreams had just come true. It was all he could do to hold himself back from grilling Dagda about, well, everything. Honestly, he might have if attention wasn't brought back to the issue at hand as Dagda tried to shake with his missing arm, having to settle for an awkward non-dominant handshake, which Percy returned, equally as firm.

Once their hands released, Percy carefully walked past him and back toward the bed to pick up his tools. Despite his scare, he was already focused on the arm once more, wanting to repair the damage just done and finish it up as soon as possible. The alien thanked him, to which Percy only smiled and nodded in humble appreciation. But the two-toned boy was a different creature when in scientific mode. "Please, come back to bed," he said, realizing how suggestive it might have sounded and blushing, but continuing on. The fact was, Dagda needed to do as he said so he could finish up the base of the arm. "I was able to save the nerves in your arm and hook them into cybernetics within the base. So when you flex your muscles or your brain otherwise tries to communicate actions to your original limb, the impulses will travel to the base and into wires that will thus control your new arm," he paused to motion to the prosthetic humanoid arm resting on a counter not too far away, "just the same as your old one. The connection can work both ways, as well. With an upgrade in the future, I can cover the arm in cybernetic mesh and silicone. It will send sensory information back through the wires, allowing you to feel with your prosthetic if you choose. However, if this is not as good an option or better than replacing it with stone, I can remove it," he said, though he sincerely hoped he wouldn't have to. He didn't imagine stone might one day soon yield any sense of touch, but then again, he was not from Earthland. Perhaps Percy was presuming too much.

While that question hung in the air, the Dagger scientist addressed the others Dagda has. It seemed they were both full of questions, which was understandable. "This is Earthland. Dagger Corp. is my family's company. We have our hands in many enterprises, but I'm head of the research department, which is where we are right now. I study all things technological and how they apply to the other sciences, including medicine, in your case," Percy answered, letting the words sit for only a moment before his own question bubbled from his lips. "When you say your people would replace a lost limb with stone, do you mean by magic? Or is it just a stationary limb-shaped statue for aesthetic purposes?" Of course, he would immediately go digging down the magic rabbit hole. Percy always did.


[wc: 646 || Percy's total: 2704 || Thread Total: 5556]

Percy's intricate work on the wires in the base slowed as the story unfolded. It was so foreign that it almost sounded like a high fantasy story. A world spirit loved mountains so much that she breathed life into them and made an entire race of living rock beings full of diversity. His mismatched eyes glimmered in bedazzlement. So enamored with the tale was he that he hardly noticed Dagda slipping his bicep under his idle hand until he was already lightly grasping his patient's flesh again. Of course, this would bring another light blush to his cheeks despite himself. Even so, he watched as instructed, the blush promptly disappearing and being replaced two dualling expressions; One the serious analytical gaze of a seasoned scientist and the other the child-like admiration of something fantastical.

Much in the way Dagda had been left speechless by his scientific explanation of synthetic skin and cracking the technology behind touch in a prosthetic limb, Percy was left in awe of the Marmor's explanation and demonstration. "W-Wow," he breathed in his trademark flustered stammer. Fingertips tingled from the flesh magically shifting from stone and back. It itched a little, but it wasn't too much different than when he handled lacrima for his inventions without gloves. Percy's mind whirled with so many questions that he almost became overwhelmed and dizzy.

Despite doing his best to come off as the opposite, the brilliant young inventor grew slightly displeased with being called a 'kid'. It was one of his buttons that always annoyed him when pushed, and though he made it a point not to rise to it because that is exactly what a kid would do, this time he was enough off his game that he did. This was the second time his age was mentioned and he felt the need to set the record straight. "I'm nineteen, which on this planet means I am over one full year into adulthood," he informed Dagda without malice, though it was quite petulant in the beginning. However, he eased up and smiled sheepishly. "You were right though. I'm a bit young to have the position I have. But, despite the fact that my family owns the company, I did earn my title. The Daggers are not known for being generous to anyone and are even less so to family if they do not meet and exceed expectations..." There was a hint of tired bitterness in his tone. Yes, he had definitely earned his place in the Research Department, if only because he'd worked so hard to prove himself with something other than magic. Still, magic was power, so there was no mistake that his lacking it was viewed as a huge detriment and weakness. Percy was a blight on the Dagger's name no matter how much success he had in his fields of study.

"Anyway," he began after quickly finishing up the wire repair and placing the connection cap onto the base. Seconds later he was on his feet. "You're definitely welcome, as long as you don't mind being a bit of a test subject. You're the first one to try this new limb. Don't worry though, even though you might be testing it, it poses no risk to you. At the very worst, should it take damage or otherwise become unusable, you can just unhook it and bring it back to me for repair. In the meantime, I'll be making sure to work hard on the synthetic skin, so you can indeed feel again. It shouldn't take too much longer," explained the young man, smiling, "so when you come back, you can tell me more about Tetsukazu, the world spirit, and the stone titans. I'd love to hear as much as you're willing to share."

He fetched the arm from the counter across the room and returned to Dagda's side. Percy raised the upper arm to the base at a slightly twisted position and as if magnetized, the two pieces clicked easily in place. The inventor then twisted it into a more natural position which locked it in with a satisfying clinking noise. "You might feel a little tingling and light pinches as your nerves adjust to the change and integrate into the wiring. Try flexing your hand a few times, please."


[wc: 714 || Percy's total: 3418 || Thread Total: 7062]

The installation that day had gone seamlessly, but it seemed that more than an arm was lost and gained that day. Percy had gladly helped the offworlder with every question he had about Earthland, while also peppering in his own curiosities about his world. A friendship was born, one that both probably needed more than they realized. Percy did, at least. His friend count could be contained on one hand, and of those, he saw them sparsely enough that he always felt awkward. He certainly felt awkward around Dagda, but it was easy to talk to him at the same time. If anyone was making it weird, it was Perseus Dagger and his myriad of ill-placed feelings. If anyone made life needlessly hard on Percy, it was Percy himself. That wasn't Dagda's problem, though.

---

Keeping true to his word, as soon as Percy finished the development of his synthetic skin with fully functioning touch sensory, Dagda was first on his list of contacts. It wasn't an untested product like the arm had been, but the titan would be the first to use it for prolonged, everyday life. He'd set up the appointment for the upgrade for today whenever Dagda was free, since this was Percy's day off.

Prepping the table of his lab with the realistic-looking skin as well as the tools to add the wires to the arm and its base, the scientist made sure he had everything. Suddenly remembering something, he scurried off for some spare parts for the arm itself, just in case certain high-use areas were starting to show wear. Actually, he could go ahead and upgrade the cybernetic wire while he was in there. It wouldn't change much, but it would make motions even more lifelike, though most probably wouldn't notice. He'd notice, though.

Now all there was left to do was wait for Dagda to navigate to his personal lab at Dagger Corp. since this didn't need a hospital visit.

Actually, maybe he should have just set up the meeting in the hospital. Peering around with a cringe, he took note of how messy his work environment was. He didn't have time to clean, did he? Was it too late to change the plans? Yeah, it'd look weird if he rescheduled now. Maybe if he hurried, he could make this place a little more presentable. Ugh, what would Dagda think if he saw all this mess? As he started frantically clearing away clutter and wiping up spilled grease puddles, his stress grew. There was no way to fix all of this. He had pieces of half-finished crap hanging everywhere from wires and thoughts scribbled in marker on every available flat surface. Chemicals bubbled along the back wall, some splattering everywhere before the burner beneath it adjusted itself to stop it. Percy always had hundreds of irons in the fire, so the entire lab was some sort of organized chaos, not unlike his brain. One corner was for magic research and had a heavily abused chair and coffee-stained table, one wall for tech research, another wall for medical studies, and the last wall was covered in books that were arranged much more neatly than anything else in the room. It was a huge room, but between the clutter and the large, half-constructed mecha in the center, it seemed cramped.

Even though it was absolutely futile, he still cleaned like an OCD housewife who had just learned her thoughtless husband was on his way home with guests.


[wc: 582 || Percy's wc: 4000 || Thread Total: 8355]