8240/Step 1 in How to Build a Cat

Step 1 in How to Build a Cat
Date of Scene:	14 October 2021
Location:	Columbia University
Synopsis:	Mairin and Demona decided on aname for their cat, and Demona gets to practice drawing.
Cast of Characters:	Mairin Moran, Susan Sullivan

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Mairin Moran has posed:
    Mairin is waiting in the Drafting and CAD lab for Demona. It's late, she's already finished her research work for the day, but she let Demona go to get something to eat for dinner while she got a head start on the new project.

    She currently sitting at one of the CAD workstations, transfering a strut into the software. No fancy Tony Stark holographic rendering for her... She has to do things the old fashioned way.

Susan Sullivan has posed:
    Demona enters a bit tentatively, still new to campus. She's holding her gas mask, rather than wearing it, and she peeks around the lab before she notices Mairin in the empty room. She enters and walks to her boss' side. "Hey," she says.

Mairin Moran has posed:
    Mairin takes a second, finishing a line, then spins the strut around appraising it before looking up. "Hey!" She motions to a nearby chair. "Have a seat. Welcome to class," She says with a chuckle. "So, I'm not sure exactly where your skills start and stop. I know you have a lot of innate talent, but I'm not sure how much formal training or teaching you have. So If I cover something you already know, please tell me. I'll probably still have you demonstrate, but I won't belabor it."

    She's like a totally different person here, than the other night. Like tieing her hair back and putting on that lab coat just lock away all of those other thoughts and emotions. Now, it's all buisness and smiles.

Susan Sullivan has posed:
    "I know old CAD stuff," Demona says, sitting in a chair next to Mairin. "Green lines on a black background. This is WAY more impressive." She shrugs off her backpack and puts it next to her, gas mask on top. "I did a lot of stuff even more old fashioned than that," she says. "High School machine shop, even AP classes, don't really prepare you for the state of the art in ten years time."

Mairin Moran has posed:
    "Good. I'm sure you'll catch on to this," she gestures to the monitor behind her, "in no time." She pauses... "How much experiance do you have in drafting? Creating paper schematics? I know it's not rally that coommon now. But I personally feel like its a basic skill every engineer should have."

Susan Sullivan has posed:
    "Oh, tons," Demona says. "Dad and I would always make paper drawings to show each other what we wanted to make." She furrows her brow and pulls out her phone. "Not exactly drafting quality, though," she says. She opens a cloud storage app and scrolls through photos, almost none of which are people, and absolutely none of which are her, at least in her current state.
    She turns the phone around and shows a picture of what looks like a movie-quality prop of the mirror from the animated Beauty and the Beast. "We did a lot of Princess accessory making when I first started," she says, swiping across the screen. The picture slid away with her thumb, being replaced by a pair of brass triangles. "Those were clip-on earrings like Jasmine's," she says. She swipes again. "Oh, I made myself a Tiara." Another swipe. "Oh, this one's cool," she says. "Dad and I spent about a year building this replica of the Nautilus from Atlantis out of metal and colored resin. Can you see the little people inside? Dad did the big window in front for my birthday. I'm in there, somewhere. It's hard to see in the picture."

Mairin Moran has posed:
    Mairin squints her eyes as she looks at the photos, opens her mouth, pauses, then smiles. "It sounds like you and your dad had a great relationship. All mine wanted--" she stops again and gives a tight grin. "But it does look like you have the basics. But you could still use some practice. Your first task, is going to be taking my draft schematics for Gwen, and turning them into final draft masterpieces." She grins, "Think you can do it?"

Susan Sullivan has posed:
    Demona considers for a moment, then says, "I am going to do my best," she says. Slipping her phone into her pocket, she nods toward the computer. "Let me squeeze in here, then tell me what to do."

Mairin Moran has posed:
    She laughs, and stands. "No, not just yet. When I say final drafts, I mean, final paper drafts. Come here..." She motions for you to follow her to the other side of the room where a couple drafting tables still linger. She stops halfway, by her usual satchel, to pick up a large folio, about four feet by two, which she carries to one of the tables.

    Once there, she unties the folio and spreads it open, rvealing pristine, beautiful, ready for drafting, schematics of... Something.

    First glance, it looks like some kind of spider, or octopus. But the arms are arn't jointed right, and they don't end in claws or suckers, but some kind of multi-use tool that has several blow-ups of its own. The body is a sphere, but imbeded with sensors and motors making it hard to tell which end is meant to be up.

    Mairin looks over at Demona with the most satisfied expression she has ever worn. Even more than when she showed off her cat schematics. "

    You asked why I joined this research project. I wanted to show you."

Susan Sullivan has posed:
    "Ooh," Demona says. "It looks super cool," she says. She points at the multi-use parts. "Are these multi-tools?" She reaches into her pocket and produces something that looks like a pocket knife. "I love multi-tools," she says. She spreads the various bits of hers out, revealing there not to be any knives, but just a lot of various things she finds useful. "I made this one just before I graduated high school," she says. "I had so many false starts with this thing. Dad and I had to really test the limits of his equipment and my skill to get the tool steel to cooperate." She folds it up and taps the paper with the closed tool. "Is this something I can talk to Peter about? He's kind of a tech-head, too."

Mairin Moran has posed:
     Mairin grins and holds out a hand toward Demona's multi-tool, "May I?"

Susan Sullivan has posed:
    Demona looks just a bit nervous, but soon hands it over. "I trust you," she says, simply.

Mairin Moran has posed:
    She takes the tool carefully, almost reverently, and steps back one step to let Demona examine the schematics. "I'm... Honestly not sure I'm ready for a lot of people to know about her yet," she says as she gently goes through each of the tools, turning the whole thing over in her hand. "I haven't even named her." Because of course that's a logical requirement.

    "You trust him?" she asks, looking up.

Susan Sullivan has posed:
    Demona looks over things, but when Mairin asks if she trusts Peter, she looks up at the other woman and says, "I trust him with my life." She adds, "I've parked the van somewhere specifically because he promised nothing would happen to it."

Mairin Moran has posed:
    She looks at the schematics, then to Demona and says nothing for a long moment. "If you trust him. Then I do," she finally says, a note of conviction in her voice. "But the schematics stay with me." She smiles, looks down at the multi-tool, then hands it back to Demona. "It's beautiful." She gives Demona a soft smile, then turns back to the plans. "But yes..." Back to business. "Those are a form of multi-tool. The design is intended to work in concert... As an army of sorts, deployed to the site of natural, or... supernatural, disasters. Where they will search for survivors, rescue, dig through debris and remains, sort, catagorize, and begin immediate rebuilding using the same materials that are already on site.

    "This," she points to an area in the body, "is a materials forge. It can accept debris, recognize it, and re-forge into materials suitable for rebuilding. They don't require food materials, or supply chain access. An army of these, could recover a hurricane site in months instead of years."

Susan Sullivan has posed:
    Demona nods. "It's kind of terrifying and amazing at the same time," she says. "What's it using for power?"

Mairin Moran has posed:
    Mairin laughs. "The same thing that's powering Gwen," she motions to the other table where Gwen's draft schematics are laid out. "And there are several other problems I haven't worked out either. But..." she shrugs. "One day."
        She takes a deep, proud breath. "But today, your task is to start making those," she points to the other table, "look like these. I don't expect you to get it right away, or for them to be perfect. But I want you to do your best. And if you have questions, please ask."

Susan Sullivan has posed:
    "Okay, I thought Gwen was a person," Demona says. "I was just rolling with it." She shakes her head, looking somewhat confused. "What or who is Gwen?"

Mairin Moran has posed:
    "Oh! That's just what I've been calling our cat. It's from a book. Guy has a big cat that follows him around on his adventures... Named Gwenhwyvar... that poofs in and out of..." She gives a shy smile. "It's a fantasy." She coughs. "But since we're both building her, we should come up with a name together." She leans back against the drafting table. "Any ideas?"

Susan Sullivan has posed:
    "For the cat or the disaster relief robot?" Demona asks, furrowing her brow. "I assume you mean the cat."

Mairin Moran has posed:
    Mairin chuckles, "Yes, the cat. This," she points to the plans behind her, "can wait until the plans are finalized for a name." Which could be forever since Demona can clearly see those plans have a 'Rev 15.115' clearly printed on them."

Susan Sullivan has posed:
    Demona considers for a bit. She considers the cat and everything that's going to happen with it. "You're going to make the cat your familiar, right?" she asks. "I don't think I should touch the name. Maybe I shouldn't even know its true name. I don't know what rules from magic are real and which aren't."

Mairin Moran has posed:
    She considers that for a moment, it obviously being something she hadn't thought of, then shakes her head. "I don't think that's how it's going to work. She's not really going to be a familiar. More of a... Companion. Nettie told me that real familiars are pretty rare, and there is a lot you have to go through to have one. I don't plan on doing *any* of that."

Susan Sullivan has posed:
    Demona nods. "Okay," she says. "Can I just be really absurd for a second here, because something did immediately come to my mind." She points finger-guns at Mairin as she reveals, "Fluffy." She pockets her hands again and says, "Actually, my first thought was mittens, but fluffy because it isn't, and also wiskers if it doesn't have any. You could also name it Gossimer, which fits a lot better there than it does on the Loony Toons character." She narrows her eyes a little, thinking.

Mairin Moran has posed:
    Mairin breaks up laughing at fluffy. She's still laughing, though trying to stop as Demona rattles off the other names. "Ohhh I do like Gossimer. It has kind of a... Witchy, magical sound to it doesn't it?" She pauses.. "What was the name of that cat on Sailor Moon?" She snaps her fingers a few times as she thinks. "Luna!" Then chuckles as another thought comes. "Or we could do Lucifer, after the cat in Cinderella..."

Susan Sullivan has posed:
    "No!" Demona protests. "Demona aside, the cat in Cinderella was a horrible little gremlin. We need a good cat name. Like Rajah or Nala or something." She shakes her head. "I need to figure out what Disney Princess you're most like, then find the cat name that's most like you, if we go that direction. Honestly, if we do that, the character I think of the most is Maurice. You're definitely a cooky-yet-brilliant inventor. That would make the cat Philippe."

Mairin Moran has posed:
    "Crazy old Maurice, huh?" She laughs. "I'll take it. Philippe..." she muses.. "I kind of like it. But it'll get shortened to Phil and I hate that." If anyone walked in right now, they'd certainly think they were discussing naming a baby. And, really, they wouldn't be wrong.

Susan Sullivan has posed:
    "I am NOT the father," Demona says. "Just specifying in case anyone planted bugs in here," she adds with a smirk. "So, I do think you should go with your instincts. Gossamer is a good first pick. You even had reasons to pick it."

Mairin Moran has posed:
    Mairin just busts up laughing, her eyes even tearing up a bit. "Well I'm certianly not the father..."

    She gets herself back under control a bit and thinks. "I think Gossamer is actually a good name for her. I can totally get behind it. *And* we both like it."

    She considers for a moment, still wiping laughter tears out of her eyes. "That *does* make me think of something. I really feel a little weird , to be honest, about Gossamer. I mean... calling it *my* familiar, when you're helping build her. She's really both of ours."

Susan Sullivan has posed:
    "Look," Demona says, "I'm looking for another teacher, but in the meantime, if you want a familiar, from everything I know from books and D&D and stuff, a familiar is just one person's. It becomes bound to you. I do NOT mind helping you do this, at all, but it can't really be shared, now, can it, even if you let me have admin rights to the software and I do stuff with it, too."

Mairin Moran has posed:
    Mairin nods. "I know. I mean, she wont be a real familiar, so I *could* loan her to you. I'd just have to program her to obey you..." She pauses and grins. "That's what I'll do. We might not be able to share her really, but I'll make sure you have all the same permissions that I do. I trust you... and it's always good to have a backup. What if I got hurt? I mean, it kind of depends on how exactly we do other things... But I'll make sure it works out that way." She walks up and holds out a hand. "Equals."

Susan Sullivan has posed:
    Demona smiles at Mairin. "I really appreciate the sentiment," she says, holding up a fist, changing things up just a bit. "Can I ask you a personal question, though?"

Mairin Moran has posed:
    Mairin smoothly trnasitions to a fist-bump. Or as smoothly as someone as un-hip as her can. "Always," she answers, casually.

Susan Sullivan has posed:
    Demona blows it up without vocalizing. While drawing her spread fingers back slowly, she says, "Does this have anything to do with what we talked about the other night? The equals thing, I mean. I'm your student, your assistant, and your rebound crush. As friends, we are equals. Does us being equals in this mean this is a project that has nothing to do with work, school, or your feelings toward me, or does it mean that you're promoting me, giving me a diploma, or telling me your feelings have normalized?"

Mairin Moran has posed:
    Mairin take a bit to soak all that in. One can almost see the gears turning. "I would say it means that I don't think of you as a student in the traditional sense. When it comes to work, yes, I'm your boss. When it comes to Gossimar, we are equals. I'm teaching you, because you *want* to be taught. And so that you can get more out of the experiance than just me telling you what to do. I'm your friend, and I want to help you grow into the best person you can be. But I'm not giving you homework or grading you. We're partners. We each bring something to the table." She takes a deep breath. "As for... the rest. No, this has nothing to do with that. But it brings up a good point that I should address. And that is, that while we are in the lab, whether at work, or working on Gossimar, we are co-workers or partners respectively. Any feelings I may or may not have are not welcome in this area."

Susan Sullivan has posed:
    "Good," Demona says with a curt nod. She gestures to the papers. "Should I get started now? I feel like there's a lot of work, and we're going to need to work hard to get it done."

Mairin Moran has posed:
     Mairin returns the nod with one of her own. "There is, and we both should. Let me know if you need any help though. By the time we're done, you'll be able to build your own Gossimar, probably more increadible than mine." She gives a wide grin and heads back to her computer. "Just please *please* ask quetions if you don't know something. I can't help if I don't know you don't know."