Angel’s desk was on fire. It wasn’t a small one either – the flames were getting close to reaching the ceiling. Heat radiated off the warping metal, washing over him like he’d made a miniature sun within the confines of his workshop.

“You should apply water to stop the burning,” Blue suggested from a safe distance.

“I never would have guessed that,” Angel replied, crossing his arms as the fire slowly started to die down. Luckily, the entire workshop was metal and there wasn’t much to actually burn.

The flames sputtered and finally died out, leaving an utterly ruined piece of scrap metal on his rather scorched table. Angel approached it warily, then nudged it with a finger.

“Generally, it is unwise to send power into runes that you don’t understand,” Blue chimed.

“They’re completely foreign to me,” Angel said with a shrug. “There’s no way for me to figure out what they do other than this. Besides, with only a tiny spark of energy, the damage they can do is very minimal.”

Blue floated over to the desk. One of the legs had malformed a little and it was no longer stable. “Your desk now stands on three legs.”

“I’ve always preferred odd numbers.”

Angel flicked the piece of ruined scrap off his desk and into a pile of broken and ruined metal – the remains of the runes he’d already tested. He checked his chair before sitting down. “And now we know what that rune does.”

“Explodes?”

“No. It was functional for about a second before it went up in flames.” Angel clicked his tongue. “You weren’t paying attention. The rune was trying to absorb energy. Then, when it couldn’t find any, it ate itself and went boom.”

“Drawing energy from the environment?” Blue asked. “A powerful rune, if that is the case.”

“I agree,” Angel said with a slow nod. “But why would it fail? If it didn’t work on its own, it shouldn’t have done anything at all. Instead, it tried to draw for a little and then went up.”

“Perhaps there wasn’t sufficient magic in the area. Could the rune only be used within a Catacomb Core, perhaps?”

“Sounds like a pretty useless rune,” Angel muttered. “But I agree about the lack of magic in the area. That’s the only thing that makes sense. Well, I suppose it’s also possible that there are some stabilizing runes that I didn’t include, but I don’t think we’ve seen anything that resembles a stabilizer.”

“There are still fifty two runes that you do not understand the function of,” Blue reminded him.

“I know, I know.” Angel waved the artifact away. “You’re not wrong. This is just a gut feeling. That rune was working.”

“Until it didn’t.”

“Until it didn’t,” Angel agreed. He took another rune a pile on the other side, mentally applauding himself for putting it at a safe distance. He was only trying to blow up one rune at a time, after all.

Magic sparked at his fingertips and he sent it into the plate before scampering off to hide behind a cabinet. Blue darted after him, and the two peeked out to watch the plate. It lit with faint white light, but nothing happened.

A knock on the door nearly made Angel smack his floating artifact out of the sky. He cursed, casting one glance back at the still glowing scrap metal before checking who was bothering him.

“It’s after dinner,” Alison said, shifting under his gaze. “I’m not interrupting you, am I?”

A ball of fire roared up from the rune, washing over the ceiling. Hot air washed past them, ruffling Angel’s hair and heating the room several degrees.

“Nah, you’re fine,” Angel replied, propping the door open and waving some smoke away. “I’m just doing some boring work.”

He took the scorched metal from his desk and tossed it onto the junk pile. He picked up the pile of untested runes and dumped them into an empty box which he then tucked into a cabinet.

“Did you get any practice in on your rune carving?”

“I worked all day today,” Alison said. “I’m not sure if I’ve really improved all that much, though.”

“Let’s see it,” Angel said, handing her his scribe. She took it and sat down, making no comment about the table’s sudden transformation.

She carved the runes into the metal as Angel watched. She’d certainly improved a little, although it wasn’t anything to write home about. When she finished, Alison touched it with the canister Angel had made, sending a small pump of energy in and lighting it up.

“Well done,” Angel said. He took the canister from her and emptied out the remaining energy. After refilling it, he handed it back to her. “Aside from your problem with powering runes, was there really that much of a problem in your classes? I’ve got no context of where you’re expected to be by now.”

“I haven’t learned a lot of the advanced runes because the professors don’t trust me with them,” Alison said, crestfallen. “But now that I can do this, I’m sure they’ll show me!”

“What runes would these be?”

“The one the class is working on right now is a fire rune,” Alison replied.

“That’s hardly advanced,” Angel said with a chuckle. He took his scribe back and flipped her piece of scrap metal over, drawing the rune with several quick strokes. “This one?”

“It looks a bit different from the one we normally use,” Alison said, examining it with a frown. “But I think that’s about right.”

“Perfect. Practice this, then.”

“That’s it?” Alison’s eyes widened. “But what about the protective runes around it? Or all the equipment to protect the lab in case I make a mistake?”

“Don’t power it until I take a look,” Angel said. “And does it really look like I’ve been doing that great of a job protecting the lab?”

Alison cleared her throat, flushing slightly. She examined the rune for several minutes, then started copying it.

“Master Angel, if you don’t mind, how do you know if a rune will work just by looking at it?” Alison asked as she carved.

“Just Angel,” he corrected. “And what do you mean? You can tell just by looking at it. If there are gaps in the line or if something is too thick or too thin, it’ll fail. Really, any major imperfection will cause it to fail.”

“Right, but what about small ones? Runes can be really precise sometimes. How can you recognize when a line is just a little too large or small?”

“Practice, I suppose,” Angel said, scratching his head. “Why do you ask? Surely your professors can do the same.”

“They can’t. That’s why they wouldn’t let me practice with the class. Since I can’t test anything without blowing it up, it’s too dangerous to let anyone else work with them. Every time a rune fails, the lab can get damaged, so they want to minimize the repair costs.”

“Well that’s just stupid. Blowing things up is a natural part of Tinkering,” Angel said. “But any decent Tinkerer should be able to recognize if a rune they know is going to blow up.”

Alison shrugged. “They don’t. It’s apparently too difficult to tell for the small mistakes. Do you use an artifact or something for it?”

“No. It’s just practice. My master had me draw every rune I know until I could recognize even the smallest errors. I guess that was effective.”

Alison finished her sketch and leaned back, a small frown on her face. She grabbed another piece of metal and started carving the rune again. “How long did that take?”

“Probably around ten thousand tries for each rune or until he was satisfied. I ended up losing count for most of them, really.”

Alison stopped carving. “For each rune?”

“Yeah. How else do you expect to master them?” Angel asked. “Haven’t your professors done the same?”

“I highly doubt they’ve drawn every single rune that many times. Most of their actual carving is done by the people that work for them or Magitech,” Alison said. “They just come up with the theory for it.”

“Huh,” Angel said. “That’s simultaneously smart and stupid. I guess it makes sense for someone that can always work in a lab setting, but I’d hate to be unable to trust my own work.”

Alison nodded. She put the finishing touches on the rune and glanced up at Angel.

“It’s okay,” he said. “I wouldn’t power it, though. The top is too wiggly. Try again.”

It was late at night when they finally stopped working. The sun had long since set, and Angel could see Alison’s hand trembling from overuse as she finished another attempt. He plucked the scribe from her grip before she could start again.

“That’s enough for today,” he said. “Overworking yourself isn’t going to get you anywhere. Give your body time to get up to speed with your mind. And get some sleep – being exhausted won’t let you improve.”

Alison opened her mouth to protest, but a yawn escaped it instead. She blushed, then nodded wearily. “I didn’t realize it was so late, Ma, uh, Angel. I’m really sorry.”

“It’s fine,” Angel said with a dismissive wave. “I’m somewhat surprised Tilly didn’t show up, though.”

“Vanessa had to do something with her.”

“Fair enough. Can you get back to your room safely?”

“Yeah. It’s not very far, and the Academy is safe. When should I come back next?”

“Tomorrow after lunch would be okay,” Angel said.

“Thank you again. I’ll see you then,” Alison said, bowing her head. “Tilly will probably come with me. I’ll ask her to be more polite next time.”

She darted out the door. Angel glanced back at his table, tempted to get to work again, but decided to follow his own advice. He realized that he hadn’t actually found out where his normal rooms were, so he unrolled his blanket and laid down. Blue hovered by the vent above him, dutifully watching it as he drifted off to sleep.