‘How do you do it?’ was the question Charlie asked five seconds into his work. It was precisely five seconds. The man knew that, with him having counted them in his head since he started. He understood something would come, yet… not so soon. Charlie had been fully prepared for a full minute of silence before the AI would gather the courage to inquire about anything done. Yet it seemed that Adam wasn't going to wait for things to start, before asking the questions.

“How do I do what?” Charlie asked, needing some more precision on what exactly he was expected to say. Was it annoying to need to ask such a thing? In a normal scenario, it might have been just that. Yet Charlie knew that it would happen. He had positively invited the chance of it happening in, so there was no real reason to be angry about it.

The AI took a second to answer. Maybe it needed some more time to think or make up with itself on what exactly it wanted him to talk about. Charlie did not think too much about it, instead of beginning the process of studying the damage on the gloves. While he had overviewed their states the day before, the man had not yet gotten to close a look at what exactly the damage included. He could see cuts on the surface rings, but not in enough detail that he could see what needed to be replaced, repaired, or just ignored. The answer to that problem was to grab one of the older magnifying monocles.

‘How do you make a piece of gear so quickly? It took less than a week for you to construct the gloves, yet the information I have been able to gather outside of this indicates that it takes months upon months of research before one can even begin on a physical product,’ Adam sent. Charlie hardly paused from the words, continuing to look over the damage done.

The outer layer had been breached heavily. That had been clear from the start, yes, but not in the way it was done. It turned out that the breach point was off to the sides, just a few centimetres below the initial stitching. An unexpected weak point. Charlie had personally thought the origin-point of the tearing to have been on the top. A mildly surprising find, but not one which couldn't be worked around.

However, there was much more to be looked over at. If only the more superficial damages were fixed, the insides would crumble in due time. Malfunctioning machinery might have been able to hold up for a while, the accumulated damage only continued to increase after that point, coming to a time where it was irreparable. If that ever came, it would be hard to find some of the rarer parts again.

“I will take your assumption as a compliment,” Charlie stated first, finding a rust-free tweezer. It was not the best tool to use when working with fine instruments, but it was the only one without any materials that could prove a danger to use. This did force the man to trust his hands to do the heavy lifting, but that was not the hardest expectation to have. Calm hands came with the position, and lifting the first layer of stitching up was easy enough. “But, there has not been a point where I stated that I finished the product in a week. And certainly not something like this.”

Ah, the middle layer had been fully obliterated. That was not too bad an outcome, Charlie having both expected and hoped for that to happen. In the event of any sudden pressure, the layer was supposed to protect the inner layer, while near or fully dampening the hit to the electronics hidden within.

Only… some of the fragments had caused some bits to hit too hard on the outer layer again. While not obvious from the outside, the outer layer clearly needed to be replaced entirely. Charlie had originally thought that a restriction was sufficient, but there was no real chance of that anymore. The needed materials were more expensive to use than just replacing the thing entirely. And when matched with the need to replace the middle layer as well… it was not looking too good for the material supplies. Charlie just had to hope that no more damage would occur with them, lest he would have to begin prioritising what could be fixed or not.

It almost made him want to look away from the electronics, dreading the possible sight of seeing them obliterated. Not that Charlie did look away, of course, making sure the equipment was intact overriding any of his other mental functions.

‘Was I wrong in the time frame? I have distinct observations about you explaining the idea to-’ Adam sent, clearly intent on defending his own view on the world. That was a flaw Charlie had noticed in the AI, its obsession with always being right causing logical flaws to occur after a while. Thinking of oneself as the superior source was never a good idea, and that lesson had clearly not been learned fully yet

“Mara did not know much about the idea at the time, but that did not mean that I had no ideas about it,” Charlie cut in, not wanting to hear too much about the AI’s explanation for its point. If he already knew it to be wrong, giving additional information could only be a waste of time. “I have known about the idea, design, how to construct it, and which materials could be used. The week that you observed was at a point where I had already gathered the needed materials, and the only step of the process was to assemble it all.”

That was also ignoring the extreme amount of fine-tuning that Charlie had spent many nights on. While he had the blueprint in his head, even he couldn't remember all the numbers with hundreds of decimal placements. Sometimes, brute-forcing solutions were the only way for an accurate answer, and that was precisely what he had gotten.

‘Even ignoring all the supposed skips, the time spent in the construction phase was incredible,’ Adam sent, sounding much like the ass-kissers of all.

Charlie almost told the AI to sod off on instinct, not wanting to deal with another person who felt the need to congratulate him on every little accomplishment in his life. The man did not ignore compliments, quite liking them and adoring them to an extreme degree when oriented towards him. But… it was not fun when done in poor spirits, meant to encourage him to freely give something up, be that work, gratefulness, or… information.

“It was not the worst of times,” Charlie said, deciding to go the route of agreeing with the AI. Maybe that would cause a premature end to that subject. The man still understood that it was all his choice, but that did not mean he couldn't make a light comment.

How frightful the twist of irony was.

That's what Charlie would say to it all a month or two back. He would have laughed to himself, before making the monkey’s paw real by describing it all in intricate detail, bloviating to the point where the listener would never truly be able to understand, while still feeling on the cusp of a mental breakthrough. That was what would have happened back then. In the current time, the only emotion was acceptance and irritation.

‘I do expect the process to have been faster with proper tools, however,’ Adam sent as a comment to his previous message. Charlie just nodded his head a small bit, more focused on peeling away the final layer on the gloves. The most inner piece of fabric had luckily had no damage to it.

If it had, it would have been hard to get back to working condition. Both gloves contained valuable materials, and the most-inner layer was one of them. Charlie was not too sure what it was, only knowing of its extreme ability to redirect heat. It was the true cause for the durability, the fabric allowing for a near-total seal, making it possible for all sides to be reinforced to the degree that they had been. The material itself was found in scarce amounts, living up to how desired it was by all. It was only found in industrial areas, and only the richer ones at that. That they had found it, to begin with, was the closest Charlie had come to a miracle in a long time.

“Yes,” Charlie agreed once again. “Usually, I can delegate most of the repeat-work to machinery. It increases precision and quality. However, I do leave most to my own hands. Makes it easier to give me a personal touch.”

And make sure that the data doesn't get copied over. Charlie knew how notorious the facility had been for graciously back-upping important data. He had no qualms about his own work being put in the same position, forcing him to make a large amount of the process in his own hand. Yes, it had slowed him down at times, but he had more than learned from the experience. Currently, he saw the experience as a good one. It had allowed him to adapt to his new work-station quite easily, after all.

‘Does your personal touch have higher priority than precision?’ Adam sent. That was an expected question. Charlie had thought long about what could have been asked, and that one was something he had ranked high. It was what everybody else had asked when he gave them that excuse.

“With a machine, you always know what you get. There are no hiccups, nothing that can come when you least expect it,” Charlie pointed out to start with. He knew there was some error to his words, as machinery very much had the ability to go haywire, but he just left that out of his reasoning. “When it comes to a human working on it, there is always the chance of some other, better method being discovered. Each time I work on something, I do my best to deliberate on every step of the process. If there is something I could do better, why not do it further on? A personal touch to the actual construction allows me to get ideas that I normally would have a hard time understanding.”

The AI was quiet once more, perhaps deliberating just how much of his words could be true. Charlie believed most of them to be so and expected Adam to find the same result at some point. He had no real problems with the opposite.

Looking inside the gloves, the electric lines were released in their full glory. The immediate scene was undesirable. Close to the fingertips, a few centimetres down on each finger was a fracture in the thread. It seemed the during the binding, that point had been weakened. Charlie felt a bit of shame for not noticing that imperfection, with how obvious it was in retrospect. But, it was something that could be fixed with a welder quite easily.

A second was spent and wasted to see if the AI would put in any input. There was only silence. Which was confusing, but… not something that Charlie decided to put any press on. The AI could be quiet if it wanted to. The man was not one to judge too harshly.

Through a quick disconnection, Charlie began to weld the fractures together. It was not the greatest of solutions, the metal being of less quality from it, but anything else would require a replacement much too costly for their reserves. If needed, Charlie could replace it later on, but it worked well enough for now.

After that was done, it came to the connections inside the device. Some of them seemed to have been dislodged, required to be put back in place before being able to work. Normally, Charlie would have made a machine do this task, the motor control required being more than he could normally muster. But, he had no choice about what he could do and was therefore forced to use his stainless tweezers. It was during the fourth point put in the correct place that the AI finally began to speak again.

‘Would it be possible to join you in the creation of gear?’

It didn't take long for Charlie to answer. He had expected that question as well.