Status Update: 3

There's water all around you, both rain pounding down on the top of the building and the distant sloshing of waste water through the pipes and arrays of your aeration facility. The room is dry at least, and with any luck, it'll stay that way.

You pull out some of the mushrooms and hold them up to your neurons again, pulling your knees closer to your chest as they begin to extract the nutrients. You have to admit, you're getting used to doing this. This was less disconcerting to adjust to than you thought it would be. (-2 mushroom)

Still no damage sustained. But if you're here, you should get some sort of long term supplies, or you're better off just leaving once the rain passes. And that may mean coming up against the Miros quail.

Hopefully not. But you're not that hopeful.

[3 actions left.]

>Stare at those firecracker plants .... Again

You take out the cherrybombs again, opening another seed pod and carefully shaking out a few of the lumpy seeds. The explosive chemical is adhered tightly to the surface of the seeds, but the outer skin of the seeds actually comes off rather easily; even with your gentle handling, there are a few trace stains on your hands that you have to wipe on the floor to get rid of. If you're careful about it, it should be really easy to get the chemicals off the seeds and the inside of the seed pods and smear them onto something else.

You happen to have a rock on hand, so you attempt to do just that, carefully running the sharpest part along the side of the seed pod to scrape off the thin layer of explosive material. It peels cleanly, and flakes to the ground softly. You carefully scoop it up, staring down at it. You're rather pleased with yourself for figuring this out, but also a little bemused about all of this. Is this what innovation feels like?

You have more than enough materials to make both your rock and your spear explosive if you wanted to. Additionally, you have enough to coat both the tip of the spear with explosives as well as the end; the explosive chemical will poison whatever it embeds into, and the part exposed to air will ignite once the spear connects. It would deal an incredible amount of damage to whatever you hit with it, living or not. You could actually fend off some of the Miros quail with this.

You could also make it more potent by adding more of the chemical, but that could be risky. The more you add, the more volatile the material will be, and you're not sure that's a good trade off with the explosive potential. Still, it is an option. (Calculated chance of success: 95%)

[2 actions left.]

>Coat both ends of the spear (success)

You set yourself to coating the spear in the explosive substance, peeling long pieces of the material off and carefully applying it to the blunt end of the spear. You rip off a strip of your cloak (you wring it out first with a grimace) and wrap it around the spear as you layer the substance on, until the upper quarter of the spear is coated in a thin layer of explosive material. It takes all of a stalk of the cherrybombs to do so, but it's a worthwhile investment. (-1 cherrybomb)

Now for the tip. You crack open pods from a second cherrybomb stalk and do the same, gently smearing the substance on with another strip of your cloak. It's almost soothing, how you're methodically scraping the explosive substance off the cherrybomb seeds and pods and carefully applying it to your spear. You almost forget you're creating an incredibly dangerous weapon by the time you're done coating the spear. (-0.5 cherrybomb)

You wipe your hands on the ground briskly before inspecting your newly explosive spear, admiring your handiwork. The wrappings are a bit crude in some parts and the tip could probably be coated better, but it won't matter once you hit something with this. You'd better be careful walking around with this though. You don't want to detonate this on yourself. (-1 spear; +1 explosive spear)

[1 action left.]

>Construct bomb (success)

You're on a roll. You use the remaining half of the cherrybomb stalk to coat your rock with the substance. It's a bit more tricky since the same tool you're using to scrape the explosive substance off of the seed pods is the item you're coating it in, but you manage to make it work. (-0.5 cherrybomb; +1 bomb)

You do wipe your hands on the ground for a while, just in case, though the sensors on your fingers tell you there are traces of it remaining. It's probably fine though. It's not enough to do much.

You won't be able to make more explosives until you get another rock, but with an explosive spear and a bomb, you shouldn't need more for a while. You probably shouldn't carry more than two explosives on you anyway. Still, it's nice to have what you do.

You set both explosives aside before slumping back against the wall with a sigh. What would Moon think of this, you wonder. Or Wind. Or even Sig. You disconnected yourself from your can. You trekked across the remains of your territory on foot, as your puppet. You've made explosives. And...

... this will all be worth it in the end. You just need a few more supplies. Maybe you could even go now. The more time you spend out here, the more Moon will suffer. What good is a savior that takes their time?

Soon. You will make this worthwhile.

You flick through memories of Moon as you start powering down.

[Proceed to Scene 4 | Return to Scene 3]