Life moves fast when you're working hard, I've found. The politics of the research group remained a bit murky to me, but they didn't interfere during my first project, which actually surprised me a bit. I had expected some ringers to enter the test, but perhaps they were the ones who quit early and didn't want to get sliced every week just to try and discredit me. After all, since a good spin master would say I'm cutting up people in the name of science and magic, how much more do they need to make me look like a Crazy Daisy? I mean it's nearly true, so that puts it ahead of the general tabloidesque attack pieces I've seen published during the one election for City Council that happened so far. In a world with slower communications, local elections have more impact on your daily life than the world I left. Perhaps that's good, but it meant that the vitriol involved was closer to home too. Anyway, after a good long time of practicing daily, managing the research with the help of Lunette, and playing...err...investigating the clockworks and technological capabilities of the vastly more modernized city, I'd made some significant gains in my stats and my skills. Ok, so it seems that ANY gain in stats is significant. Walking all the stairs for my apartment and not living so close to all the places I wanted to visit did result in some actual physical gains, primarily because I spent my hansom budget on clockwork toys and parts. I'd even built an articulated grabber device, much like the "hydraulic/pneumatic robotic arm" kits that my kids put together, typically with a lot of help from me, totally because they needed it and not because I was having too much fun with their toys. Totally. I'd gained enough skill from that process that it was worth adding to my important skill list, because who cares what my walking mastery is at. Changing gears, if you'll pardon the pun, did wonders for my acuity, and my engineering skill likely reflected my abilities in this world, since the parts and products available here didn't match what I had prior practice with or my somewhat unused and rusty knowledge.

{

Mental:

Energy Conversion

3.172

Acuity:

Perception:

Memory:

13

8

11

Energy Emission

2.770

Psyche:

Energy Control

2.421

Wisdom:

Insight:

Willpower:

9

10

14

Channeling

0.278

Physical:

Instructor

0.156

Strength:

Coordination:

Endurance:

9

9

12

Meditation

2.821

Engineering

1.593

}

So, pretty serious growth given the rates I'd had before, and the semi obsession with the gears and gadgetry.

Anyway, ultimately the research showed that, out of my 113 that completed the testing, 45 never could get the healing to work, or perhaps it was the meditation they weren't getting right, it's hard to know with one test group. Of the remaining 68, 33 got to the point where in the tenday between tests, they'd have completely healed the original cut, 29 achieved the ability to heal sufficiently on the spot as to not need a bandage, but the cut was still somewhat reddened at the end of the hour session, 5 made it to the point that the cut was gone by the end of the session, and the prodigy of the group could actually heal within 5 seconds of entering meditation, and once managed to enter meditation while the cut was being made, with the result that the tester had to verify the blade position and sharpness with a sheet of paper. That rivaled my current capability with much less practice, so probably this one individual had a better attunement with their own body or a stronger affinity for the magic. Still, it was an overall promising result. Even with only one nearly instant healer in 100, with 5 at the one hour level with only a few dozen hours of training. This one even volunteered to retest, and while less speedy on the second arm, was still fully healed and chatting with the tester over at the snack area at the end of the session. Fantastic. Now to build a bunch of charts and numbers and bury the lede in a blizzard of statistical jargon. Still need an anti-catchy title for the results. Something long and underwhelming.

With the research accomplished and the final de-clarifying work underway, I began drafting such stellar sentences as follows:

"The microscopic nature of the primary incisions into the posterior dermal surface of the cubital ulnar olecranon allowed for immediate observation of the initial coagulatory processes vis a vis the preliminary stages of the palliative and remediatory reintegration of the outer dermal strata without extended abeyance on the part of the observer and avoiding any myalgia infliction as well as minimizing the orchidalgiological responses." Which was a long long long way of saying with small cuts on the elbow, we could watch it scab and heal more quickly and it didn't hurt as much. I had acquired an anatomy textbook from the Omni library so I could put it in accurate terms but ones almost any magical theorist was unlikely to recognize. In the hands of a trained doctor, it would be a bit of a slog, but less obscure. Going back through the materials after I had thoroughly mangled them, I felt a bit nauseated by my effectiveness, but the point was obfuscation. It was as if I were taking a fairly simple technical manual and acting like a clueless mid-level editor, I was working to rewrite it for so-called "precision and accuracy", while showing off my erudition and vocabulary. Anyway, that example should be sufficiently painful, so I'll spare you the remainder of the document.

The results boiled down to this:

Roughly half the people failed entirely. I wanted to lead with this because it makes the system sound bad. Of the remainder, most had minimal gains. Only a small fraction succeeded at increasing their healing speed, with improvements between 25% faster and 900% faster, with a singular top end outlier at an astonishing 40000% gain.

During the obfuscation final pass, I removed the prodigy outlier. While it was legitimate, I didn't want to publish that someone could heal more than 400 times faster than normal with this method. There was no way to obfuscate that caliber of result, so my final decision was to completely pull the data point from my research summary and report the findings without it. Fortunately, the remaining results, once understood, should be good enough to ultimately get others to validate my research outcomes.

I went intentionally overboard on the copies of the final documents and actually contracted a printing press to make 1000 copies, with 100 actually bound in book form on archival quality materials, such as existed at this point, and the remainder bound using basic stitch binding, which is something like the triple staple option you might be more familiar with, only with string loops in the place of the staples.

All of that accomplished, I invited Lunette to a celebratory dinner at a nicer establishment, instead of our usual meal in the Omni cafeteria.

The evening was dreary, with a light fog and rain combination, leaving mud on the paved roads from those carts coming off the unpaved outskirts and construction areas. The sidewalks were relatively clean, but the smell of the damp, mud strewn city is somewhat awful. A damp countryside can be pleasant or not depending on the livestock in the area, but some of the effluvia of industry and under-washed masses of people with wet woolen garments is a different kind of stench. Fortunately, and likely by foresight and design, the restaurant had a heated cloak room separate from the main dining area, which confined that smell away from the patrons.

We checked our outerwear and headed into the dining room. The wine steward was offered, but we both opted for hot tea instead.

"So, Mr. C. The document is finished. Did the publisher say how long until delivery?" Outside of the research area, her calling me "Mr C." sounded somewhat like a pseudonym used in some hard boiled detective novel or spy thriller.

"The shop anticipated a full tenday for the setup, plus another tenday to print and bind the simpler copies, and one extra tenday after that for the finer bindings."

"So quickly? I expected nearly a season for the printing, not just a month."

"Miracles of modern technology, Ms. V."

"Yes, you and your clockwork obsession. I was beginning to think you were magic mad, but I've seen you playing with your toys!" Her eyes crinkled in amusement as she chided me.

"That's… not untrue. I prefer to call it investigating the principles of physics with manipulables, but that may be my high falutin' translation skills on overdrive from the last tenday of scientificating our results." I managed to elicit a full out laugh at that one. Thankfully, it wasn't mid-sip, or I might be wearing her tea, instead of merely worrying that she might spill some.

After some idle conversation about the perpetual damp of the last week, our meals were finally brought out. Hers was a lovely spice crusted beef filet and mine a nice herb and citrus chicken, and our conversation wound down. We each tried the other's main course, and I found them both quite tasty, although she didn't like the tangy citrus notes as much as I did. I guess nobody is perfect.

After concluding the meal with a bit more tea, a lovely caramel and nut tart, and a dollop of cream, we collected our cloaks and left the restaurant. The rain had stopped, and as a result, it seemed that the light fog was becoming more dense.

"Hansom?"

"No, let's walk a bit, Mr. C. We've sat enough for now, and without the rain, the evening is pleasant enough."

"That works for me, Ms. V."

The walk back towards the Omni was pleasant, nodding at the others walking the streets. As we turned the last corner, I was surprised by the squeal of a horse and a loud crunch. As I turned to look, I saw a large barrel careening toward us, flung out from a cart that had run into a stanchion. I thrust out my arm, shoving Lunette out of the path as best I could as the barrel slammed into me. It was at this moment, I regretted that I didn't have more than Leatherskin mode engaged as I felt and heard a snapping in my arm. The barrel almost missed Lunette, but it clipped her in the back. That small contact was enough to throw her off her feet and onto the muddy street we had just turned on. I reached toward her, but the pain in my arm spiked, and I blacked out.