Chapter 7
"...What is it?" Gleaming gem asks as he looks back at Vinny.
"It's an Automatic Dirt Discretionator!" Vinny replies with a broad smile. "It helps make sure I get the perfect kind of dirt to be used in the next invention I'm going to show you, But first! An explanation on just what kind of dirt I need!" He quickly seems to pick them up and begin showing them each of the sections of the machine.
"First! The Conveyance section that brings the dirt in from my stockpile under the house, it has to be there in order to try and get as much perfect dirt as possible, even if there's not a one hundred percent conversion rate to make all the dirt the perfect dirt... Although I still have yet to try Equestrian dirt... So I'll have to find a dirt salespony there, I'm sure I'll be able to find one. Anyways that's not important..." He quickly gets himself back on track once he realizes that he had been rambling. "...What is important is that I've been able to turn a seventy percent success on my dirt because of this machine."
He then pulls them along to the next section, various numbers of sewn together conveyor belts that are moving piles of dirt back and forth on the machine for no apparent reason. Mick gives a confused look to the dog, prompting an eager explanation.
"This part of the machine sends the dirt along to the various scanners and sorters, if the scanners find any bad dirt they dump the pile through a sorter, sifting as much of the bad dirt away from the good dirt as possible." He points to one of the darker piles of dirt, "See... That dirt is bad dirt because it's too dark, most likely too much moisture... It'll be sent back down into the depositor to away more growing and perfection into the good dirt."
"Um... Vinny..." Widget starts nervously. "... Forgive me for not understanding the genius behind your invention... but why do you need an Automatic Dirt... Uh... Dis-cretion-ator?" She had to slow herself down at the last part of the machine's name to make sure she didn't trip over her words.
"As I said Widget, it's for the next machine... We'll get to that in a minute... Anyways, onto the next part!" He seems to squee a little as he continues on his tour, stopping in front of a giant mess of pipes, a few of which seem to defy the direction gravity is supposed to pull the dirt.
"This section of the Discretionator brings the good dirt through several filters to sterilize it and make sure there isn't any harmful bacteria still growing in it... and it also tosses out the occasional stray worm that managed to get into the crop." He places a paw on his chin. "It's a little weird... While the parts of the dirt that the worms feed on gets sorted into the bad dirt section... the worms themselves don't get sorted out until this part... weird..." He mutters a little bit as if this is actually the first time he really thought about his invention.
"Anyways... This is the final stage of sorting before the good dirt gets put into those quart-sized Mason jars over there which can then be directly transferred to my next machine." He explains with his usual smile as he shows them the dirt being a uniform brown color that almost blends in with the wall of his home had it not been for the metal caps on the jars.
Mick blinks as he looks at each of the jars, a small pang of worry shooting through him as he thinks about the rest of his team. "Terry... You would love it here... where are you?" He says barely above a whisper as he thinks about the energetic Furret who always decided to live in the moment instead of worrying about the future.
In a large, foreboding forest, Terry's ears began to heat up. His head snapped to attention, taking his eyes off of the two eevee cowering near him. "...Someone's talking about me..." he observes mentally as his ears monitor the area for predators and still trying to find a decent burrow to keep them all safe until he could figure out where Mick was.
Mick let out another sigh before he noticed Vinny sitting next to him, crouched actually but that wasn't the point.
"I take it there's someone got put here that ya cared about and you don't know where they are...?" He asks quietly, earning a nod from Mick in response. Vinny lets out a small sigh, his eyes focusing on the floor in front of him. "I know how you feel... I got to this city as a pup, had to walk here the entire way from one of the far cities." By this point even Widget and Gleaming gem were interested, it was a rare event indeed to hear about Vinny's past.
"We were taking a steam train to Khinolduhr... I don't know a lot of the finer details, but there was a cave in that broke most of the passenger cars and the next thing I knew I was covered in scrapes and laying on the ground... When I went to try and search for my parents I had heard them on the other side of a rock wall that had been between us... They told me to head to the city... to Khinolduhr... and that they would meet me there... they put a lot of trust in me... and I'm still waiting for them..." He finishes quietly as a few tears build up in his eyes. He jumps just a hair as Mick hugs his side, He seems a bit shocked at first until he slowly hugs the little fire mouse back.
Widget sits down next to him and places a paw on his shoulder, "Vinny... We're here for you... just ask, and we'd be happy to help..." She says before giving him a hug of her own. Gleaming Gem and Emma walk a bit closer, but don't engage in the hug, feeling that it would just put too many in the mix of sad feelings.
...
And then just as suddenly as he had been upset, Vinny bounces back up while hugging Widget and Mick, "Welp! That's enough moping! Time to get back to showing you guys some amazing inventions!" Widget and Mick both get a bit stunned by the sudden mood swing before he drags the two of them off, leaving a stunned Quilava sitting next to an equally confused unicorn.
Vinny stops in front of a large machine that looks more like a building boiler than anything else. "And this!" He says with a flair, "Is the invention that I have not named yet because I have absolutely no idea what it does!"
Widget gave him a confused look. "Aren't you supposed to know what the invention does?"
Vinny gave her a sheepish grin, "Well... I had only named the discretionator after I had found out what it did... All I know is that this machine goes and takes the perfect dirt over there... and dispenses some sort of orange-colored liquid..." He confesses, eliciting a facepaw from the other Diamond Dog.
"Why do I even try to understand your logic...?"
The lighter Diamond Dog chuckled and hugged his cousin again. "Because you're a masochist... anyways! Who wants to try some of the Orange Juice?" He exclaims as Emma and Gleaming Gem walk over.
He quickly picks up one of the filled mason jars and offers the mildly-bright orange liquid to all of them.
Widget quickly takes a step back, chuckling nervously. "Well Vinn... As much as I love helping with your inventions... I'm going to sit this one out..."
Gleaming Gem backs up as well. "Yeah... I'm still trying to get the pink spots off of the underside of my hooves..."
Mick and Emma both give a look of confusion at the diamond dog and unicorn. "What's their problem? It's just... Admittedly strange... Orange juice. It's not like it's on fire or anything..."
Emma took a wary look at the 'drink' in Vinny's paw, "Well... I think it would be best to be cautious if others are as well..."
While Mick and Emma had been discussing in the pokemon language Widget had actually asked Vinny a good question.
"Why can't you try it? You've got plenty of medical supplies around in case something happens..."
Vinny let out a small sigh. "Widget... Widget, Widget, Widget... Widget..." He tsk's, "... I'm the inventor... If something happens to me, I wouldn't be able to invent anymore... With volunteers I get results easier and I can make sure all the necessary safety steps are all in place."
"...Vinny... You may get volunteers for your inventions... but you still need to think about what might happen if something went wrong..."
"I do, that is why I have medical supplies for all sorts of accidents or injuries save those of accidental implosion or explosion and so far this orange juice causes no physical damage whatsoever, I tried it with several types of plants and an ore tree sprout."
"Vinny... Where exactly did you get an ore tree sprout to work with?"
"Uh... I don't know, I kinda just found it in my dirt garden..."
Mick sat on one of the small stones that had been shaped into an improvised chair in the workshop as he stared at the metal cup in front of him, filled almost full with a bright orange liquid. He had begun to second guess his choice to help Vinny with his experiment when the dog had him sign several legal documents that basically said 'if anything bad happens, you can't sue me because you volunteered'... It was really one of THOSE days...
He licked his lips as they seemed to have suddenly gone dry, His nerves had him shaking a little as he began to bring the metal cup to his mouth, slowly opening to drink the... surprisingly tasty... liquid. After a few gulps he moved the cup away from his mouth and braced himself for spontaneous combustion, or implosion, or poisoning pains... or... well... anything.
Vinny, who was hiding behind an improvised stone wall with an upturned cooking pot acting as a makeshift helmet and his trusty Frying Pan of Fiendslaying at the ready in case a tear in the fabric of reality brought some sort of unspeakable horror over for tea, peeked over his barricade, as did Emma, Widget and Gleaming Gem.
"...Did it work?" Vinny prods as he starts to move a bit more from out of his cover, sensing no danger.
"I don't feel any different..." Mick replies with a shrug.
"Darn! Welp... Back to the drawing board..." Vinny replies as he takes the pot off of his head, leaving a slack-jawed Widget and Gleaming Gem behind the barricade as he walks over to the cyndaquil and carefully takes the cup. "I really would've expecting something... well... Something." He says as he examines the liquid.
"It was actually pretty tasty... kinda like an Oran berry..." Mick says hopefully, "Maybe it could still be used to make a drink to sell?"
"That is true... but what's an Oran berry? Is that something from your world?"
"Yeah, it was a really good berry that was a perfect blend of flavor to be palatable for anyone, from pokemon to humans, and it even had minor healing properties so it was amazing for helping young pokemon keep healthy if you didn't have enough money for medicine."
"Hmm... Maybe some of the fruit from your world made it over... That way we could try some Oran Berry Extract to add to the drink to give it healing qualities?"
"We could certainly try it... Widget... Why are you staring?"
Widget only gave a few blinks as her brain decided that the particular moment she was experiencing was a good time for a hard-reset, leaving Gleaming Gem to answer the question.
"Cyndaquil... I think the drink worked..." He replies with a dazed tone, catching Vinny's attention.
"What do you mean? There wasn't anything amazing that happened, or strange, or weird... How could the drink have worked?" Vinny asks.
"You turned a spell... that takes even expert unicorns years to learn, let alone master... and turned it into an orange drink... BY USING DIRT!" Gleaming Gem explains in a loud voice, the rational thought processes of his brain had decided to take an early day off from work.
"...I did?" Vinny replies with an impressed look at the cup in his paws.
"He did?" Mick echoes as he looks at the cup as well.
Vinny gives a small chuckle, "Well... Whadda ya know... I invented a translation potion."
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Love the Mad Quack Inventor, there are NEVER enough in the stories making rounds anymore
5101638 The best part is that he invents on a whim, giving him the flexible opportunity to rival pinkie pie in terms of explanation.
Glad to see that your story was added ^^
5105444 Thank you very much, may I ask which parts you have enjoyed the most so far?
5105488 I loved the discription you used when they first arrived, it was adorable! Besides errors here and there, it is a pretty good read so far. The only thing you need in my opinion is a picture for the cover. Pictures are like eye candy, they easily grab the viewer's attention so they can get a basic feel for the story. After all, a picture is worth a thousand words.
5106312 I know, I really need to find one, although I have a picture in progress that I'm making on my own... The progress isn't going too fast though...
5106435 here is one that can work.
Cover art
5108202 i'm sorry, but for mentioning the jar of dirt scene, i have to tell you something
the only one acting in that scene is Depp, because he forgot his line and did improv instead, and everyone else is giving real reactions.
Behold the power of dirt
Well, some people actually eat dirt. Fun fact, as long as you don't eat too much of it and eat normal things too, it's actually quite healthy.
5346189 I thought everyone already knew that. I think it's called enforced method acting?