"I'd've left it in so he'd come back after the next round of testing, but that's what I get for subcontracting, I guess."

Robo-shrug. "Guess I'm just nice. Also that only works if you trust him to catch the bug ever."

"Hah, true enough. I guess this way I can just bring it to his attention and use that as extra leverage if I need it."

"Fine by me. How about that cash, then?"

Tessa emerges from the power armor's husk and pulls out her wallet, then counts out twenty bills and hands them to Margaret. "Don't spend it all at once. Or do. I don't actually care."

"It's all going to parts, I know that much. Still haven't decided which parts, though--probably a combination of really fast processors and a hard drive that'll fit a few centuries of eidetic memory."

Tessa re-immerses herself in the power armor. "Sounds good. I'll find you if I want more robotics done, or you can find me if you want to go ahead with that time-sharing thing."

"Sounds good! See you." 

"Yes. Goodbye."

Margaret heads out of the lab. Hmm, what to do now? Can't talk to the supervisor until the workshop reopens tomorrow, can't do homework because she's done it all, might as well go back to her room and write drivers for 360 degree vision. No sense having cameras in the front and back of her next generation head without some way to integrate the data. 

Lucy's already there, reading something on her laptop. She raises a hand in distracted greeting as Margaret enters.

She manages a "Hey" in response, then parks at her desk and tunes out the universe. Tessa was right about one thing, she should definitely have a complete development environment in her head so she can code while she walks; the next time she upgrades her central processor she'll have enough attentional capacity that she won't even maybe bump into things. And of course virtual visual overlays are much more convenient when you can put them on top of the sky and still see the full circle of the world around you.

She'll be at this until she has to sleep, unless something interrupts her.

Nothing interrupts her. Lucy eventually clicks off her desk lamp and climbs into bed.

The next day begins mostly like the first. During Workshop, however, she's approached by a boy who happens to be an enormous concrete statue. "Hey, I'm Josh. Manhattan. You're - Upload?"

"That's me! It's good to meet you; I was actually planning to look you up."

The concrete of his face stretches into a slightly nervous smile. "Ethan told me he talked with you and you said you wanted some batteries? And batteries are kind of, um, my thing. Well, nuclear microscaling is my thing, but batteries are- part of that."

"Yes! I was thinking I could trade you some nice dense batteries for a third arm you could mount on a workbench and control with your mind. I can make one that's good at fine manipulation, and with some practice it should feel almost as natural as your other arms."

Josh nods slowly. "Ethan mentioned that too. It sounds like a good trade. Um, I've got a range of batteries based on what kind of energy output you're looking for, or I can do custom if you're way outside my range - I've got sizes from triple-A to car battery, with corresponding but much higher output. Lifespan-wise, the isotopes I usually use are good for 300 years, but I can get some with a half-life of a couple thousand for an extra $150. I don't know where the school gets their nuclear materials but they're really efficient."

She shows him her expected power consumption and planned chassis dimensions, plus how much of that volume is reserved for batteries in the best case and how much room she can probably make in the worst case. "How much time between recharges can I get at those sizing options? Also, I'll take the three hundred year version, I don't know how my requirements are going to change in the next few centuries."

"...okay, miscommunication - 'battery' is kind of a misnomer here. We're not talking storage, these are generators. You wouldn't be recharging. -and yeah, I'd go for the three hundred year version too, who knows what's gonna come up? Maybe Morty's gonna figure out how to make things that don't explode and we'll all be using cardboard tesseracts."

"Generators? Excellent. In that case . . ."

She does math in the margins of her notes for a minute, then comes up with a range of energy numbers from 'normal day' through 'I attached everything on my long-term wish list and turned it all on at once.' The top end is quite high; her long-term wish list includes things like 'anti-gravity-based flight'.

"I don't need the very top of this range, I can have capacitors or actual batteries to store power for if I need to go all out briefly."

“Yeah, you’d need a car battery for that. But your target’s totally reasonable, you could make that work with a lantern cell. I’d recommend a backup too, given your stated specifications you’ve got just enough room for it and you really do want some redundancy built in just in case.”

"Yeah, I definitely want an onboard backup, and maybe a third one I can keep in my room and swap out if something happens to one of the other two. What do you want in your third arm? Both in general terms and any extras, if you want a built-in soldering iron or a second thumb or whatever I can do that."

He shakes his head. "I've got soldering irons, and I think a second thumb would probably just get in the way. I just want good manual dexterity and enough strength to pick up what I need to. I can make you a set of three batteries for two arms? That's one more battery than, um, arm."

"Sounds good to me! I should have the arms and the control headband done by the end of the week, and then I'll need to calibrate them to your brain."

“Great, that’s about the timeframe for the batteries too. Um, I should brief you on the safety regs. Basically - I make my stuff so that if you break it, it implodes completely instead of, like, leaking radioactive material everywhere or exploding, because that’s bad. So instead it implodes and leaves behind a lump of lead. So, if you break it, and it really shouldn’t break because it’s pretty sturdy and you don’t do combat stuff, but if it does, just let me know and I’ll replace it. And, uh, obviously don’t take it apart, that’s a bad idea.”