The high school's robotics club has a supply budget, but it's not the biggest, and anyway she can't use that stuff for personal projects. Her dad is willing to donate scrapped car parts from his auto shop, but his customers have been having a run of good luck lately and he hasn't had to throw much out. All of this explains why Margaret is detouring through this junkyard on her way home from school, looking to score some free parts.
"Huh. I'll give that a try." She turns away and does the blowtorch at empty air again, but this time she calls out "Fire strike!" as she does it.
Her flame doesn't seem any stronger than usual.
"Hmm, one try isn't conclusive but I don't think that did anything." She starts practicing two-handed fire again.
"Might be just a focus thing, then. Or maybe it only helps some of us." She shrugs. "Welp, have a nice day."
"You too!" She would wave, but, fire. How far apart can she manage to get her hands without losing one of the streams?
Once she gets two separate streams going at once, it's like she's learned a new trick - it doesn't seem to matter where her hands are - just how long she can keep the focus and power up for both.
Excellent. She starts trying to do the same thing with her face, mostly because being able to look like she's breathing fire while having dragon arms is an amusing concept.
That one doesn't work.
Something feels different about her face the next time she transforms her arms, though.
Time to go look at herself in the bathroom mirror! She checks how far up her arms the scales go on the way there.
Just past her elbows! They're kind of soft where she needs the flexibility on the joint.
Neat! She flexes her elbows back and forth and pokes them experimentally. Now, what if anything is up with her face?
She has a smattering of small, soft-looking scales surrounding her eyes, and down her cheeks. Something in her facial structure is a little different, it's hard to put your finger on it even watching it change, though.
Ooooh, she looks so awesome like that. She takes selfies both ways and practically skips back to the gym to keep practicing. Maybe the face scales are a sign that she can make fire come out of her face if she tries hard and believes in herself.
Her magic has had enough of stretching for today. The 'muscle' for that just isn't there, there's no indication that she's going to get it right now by force of effort.
She could sign up for the self-defense class the Association runs if she wants.
Monday-Wednesday-Friday from six to eight. The next run starts two Mondays from now, the 'basics' course is slated to last six weeks.
Robotics club is Monday-Wednesday three to five, so that works out nicely. Margaret puts her name down, rests a bit more, and does a bit more control practice with the fire before she heads home. She wants to be able to keep her flame as small and steady as a candle.
Her magic doesn't seem to like 'small' but she's getting better.
She is right there with her magic on bigger being better, but you never know when you might need a very small fire. Also, control is hard and she will get better by doing the hard thing.
Teddy texts her as she's leaving.
I had an idea - are the scales when you transform loose at all? Could test toughness by pulling one and testing it, if that doesn't hurt you.
She texts back:
Good idea! Pulling bits off myself is yikes but it's better than the alternative.
And tries it. Can she get a little one off the back of a forearm?
If she pries hard enough, yes. It stings.
And then there's a hole in her scales, which is awful. Quick swap to skin and back to fix that.
She doesn't need to swap, actually - the scale reforms and adds a little bit to the near-undetectable strain of unwinding, making her aware of it again for a moment.
It's so convenient how fast that is. She texts Teddy again
Got one off! Going to try frying it.
and puts it on the gym floor and fries it.
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