"Heeey Tourmaline! I'll be a second!" 

I laugh lightly at the sound of her zipping about, the little rustling warmth of her bustling about. 

I lean down and heave up my toolbox by the leather handlewrap, the whole meter long aluminum thing rocking gently in my hand. 

My eyes dart down with bemusement. 

"You decent?" 

"Mhm!"

My other hand slips down to the door knob, feeling the little click of the security system disengaging and the whole thing slipping open. 

She even cleaned up, the dork! I smile a bit despite myself. 

The toolbox clunks heavily down onto the floor, and I spread my arms open wide, fingers wiggling a lil excitedly. 

"C'mere, c'mere, cutie." 

She steps up close, smiling timidly, walking a little on her toes into her arms. 

I pull her up into my arms and hug her firm and tight, the soft blanket of my soul's light resting against hers, picking her up for a moment to grin brightly into her eyes. 

"You're adorable." 

I set her down against her bed, and kiss her forehead soundly, a hand gently cupping her cheek as I feel her blush. 

She settles in with a wordless shy breath.

"You're so light! The cyberization went really well, honestly. I knew that there was a reason we put in the dust-doped nerve system, but goodness - the efficiency and ease of it is better then I expected, honestly, even with how well Penny has done for herself." 

I kiss her nose softly, and slip my hands down to her wrist, examining her hands. 

"Oowh..."

"Oowh?"

I boop her nose delicately and pointedly. 

"Oowh!" 

I do a conspiciously comically frowny face.

My thumb swirls gently along her hands, feeling the extra concentration of her aura pooling into the skin, little patches of skin that are just a little redder and rawer then they should be. 

"Your hands aren't organic - or at least as organic as they used to be. There's always going to be some wear and tear, especially with how energetic your fighting style is. Let me see..." 

I lean down and clack off the top of the case, and riffle through a few containers before "ahh!"ing satisfiedly, pulling out a thin plastic package filled with a funky blue fluid with a flourish of my fingers atop it. 

I rest my hands atop hers. 

"Your soul is probably still used to treating this sort of thing like damage, but you can't just think of it like that. It's basically just a handwarmer, yeah? It'll loosen it up and make it cling back to the articulation of your body. It's just some chemicals that get all exothermic when you squeeze them, and a bit of heat dust to help it along. Try it out?"

She squeezes it lightly, her eyes closing. 

"It'll take a mo..." 

I gently rest my palm atop the back of her hand, fingers curling gently around the width of them, fingertips rubbing and almost rocking back and forth atop her clenched hands. 

"But yeah." 

I brush my fingers past her red-tipped bangs, the very tip of them playing against the skin of her brow. 

"Have you ever tried the dustless versions of these, by the way? Had, once, but it was a kinda wimpy thing. Not like this one. It's supercooled thing - I think one of the standards is sodium acetate, but the mixtures with dust make 'em a little weird. When you poke it, the whole things firming up, and you'll get the latent heat out, and that'll jostle the dust suspension enough to make it proper hot." 

It's a gentle heat, the warmth of a just-right vent radiating that perfect warm gust of summer, steady somehow, even as the heat radiates further and further, sinking into the muscle and skin and just barely pressing out past her clenched fingers. Her fingers sort of relax too - like supple skin right out of a bath. 

"Normally it'd be a lot fussier to get the heat to penetrate it and it'd be a lot smellier, but your aura's got the whole bounding box thing going. It'll be a few more minutes before it's done, so keep your hands on it." 

I rub rub my hands on her shoulders - I can feel the firmness of the metal below, the soft squish of the 'muscle' below, corded fibers that help with the finer motions all nice and supple. My fingers trail along the slope of her shoulder, easing back and forth 'til I start to feel the seam slip back into the world, nail just brushing against the edges of bound thread, thumbing softly at the edges to start to peel it back.

Her shoulders slide in places a little, legs twitching and knees knocking together a little at the feeling.

My palm winds around her shoulder, rubbing back and forth for a moment before my thumb dips into the divot of her skin at the seam, clamping firmly around the ball of it. 

I twist it, clicking cooly out of the socket, leaving her arm floating in my hand, chrome core wrapped with black and red wire mixed with multicolored dazzling dust-metal sheets all enwrapped in a carbon fiber mesh, a thin coat of red paint helping it all color up nicely. 

I pat my hand along her arms, feeling and watching the flex of the muscle at the little gliding touches of my fingertips, and smile a little blushily. 

"Strong girl~."

I plop her arm down uncerminously on the bed, and reach down to drag out a laptop, a pure yellow polishing cloth, and a springy usb-c cable. 

I plop my laptop down beside her, flipping through some screens quickly and plugging the usb cord in. 

I slide in behind her, and flick a fingertip just behind her ear, slipping past a soft strand of hair to tap back the port cover and plug it in. 

"There. Should do the software stuff automatically, and you can fiddle with the ambience if you'd like." 

My tongue lap-lap-taps against my lips soundly, a bit of saliva slipping out before I wet the cloth quickly. I lean in, and blow firmly into the socket, lips pursed prettily as I watch the first layer of grit fall away, before reaching the hand up to press the cloth in, slking gently against the metal, folded fabric pressing down into the metal, winding side to side to leave it all clear and polished, then I go and pop off her other arm and do the same bit there. 

"Oh yeah. Couldya lie down for me? There's a few things deeper inside 'll need to fuss with." 

"...Okay!" 

She brushes her hair back for a moment, and stretches out on the bed, curling her chest around a big bundle of covers. 

My hands slip down her sides, gently and professionally lifting up her tank top and setting it aside, my hands sweeping up to the sides of her neck, rubbing for a moment to keep her warm, before plopping my thumb down to click her back open down the seam of her spine, plates lifting and separating with the soft whir of a smol electric motor. 

I reach into the beautiful mess of steel and chrome, a breathless little chuckle half-crossing my lips at seeing the remnants of sable's grafitti still there, glistening in that signature violet of hers. 

My attention snaps to her 'lungs' - really two plastic cylinders with a thin sheet of glimmering red combustion dust deposited on the surface, the interface with the old breath of her body with something more technological. It's a marvel, really. But probably the easiest thing to touch up... 

There's the main little block of her cpu, plopped down there - there's the head unit up there too, but that's mostly just the back-up, so less wear and tear there. Here, it's nestled just beneath her lungs, a shielded block of slightly frosted steel from the little contribution of frost dust. I nab a thicker, shaggy grey red cloth, and wipe that all off - wouldn't be good for that to build up too too much, then pull out a screwdriver to get each corner undone, ratcheting in silence for a good minute or two. 

"Annnd there." 

I flip it with a flick of my thumb, and then slide my screwdriver's tip along the surface of the CPU, scraping away the tattered remains of the thermal paste, before wiping it off with my thumb and a hint of aura, before rooting around again in my case. I pull out a little injector, pointer and middle fingers wrapped around the hilt and squeeze down with my thumb, carefully easing the cool gel back and forth along the surface, before wrapping it back up tight.