Emery woke disorientated. She pushed Little Ted, sorry, Dunkel aside and began to make herself some black tea. Her kitchen was a mere three steps from the end of her bed. There were two rows of large tiles which designated the kitchen area. The rest was flimsy carpet while the bed and living room were all in one.
"I guess I dozed off," she said out loud as she sent a thread to her phone and pulled it over holding it up in front of her sleep filled eyes. Emery didn't own a clock, her phone had the time.
It was just after ten am. It was a Saturday, and she had nowhere to be and no money until next Tuesday.
As the kettle boiled, she made her tea by feel using her threads as she had done it so many times. As long as she put the milk in the same place in the fridge, it was easy. She had to check her stock of tea bags. She tried not to drop any as the box floated over and it tilted down so she could peer inside.
Emery sighed. She would have to reuse at least a few.
"I hate being poor," she told Dunkel. He didn't respond. After a few moments contemplation, she remembered she had to be in contact with him, with her threads, in order to communicate.
She repeated her statement while moving Dunkel around her bed, practising moving his legs and arms in a Teddy Bear walk.
With six of her threads on Dunkel and six engaged in tea making Emery was at her limit. Tea making came as second nature, but she had to concentrate to walk Dunkel.
"Sob. Poor Emery," Dunkel said. The communication came through her threads into her mind. It was a tricky thing because her brain registered the words as if they were spoken aloud.
Emery couldn't tell if Dunkel was being consoling or sarcastic.
"Tell me how to make money Dunkel," Emery asked.
"Use ... power," Dunkel said in his disjointed way.
"You'll see that is not as easy as it sounds. Even with these handy skills," Emery stated as she took a sip of her freshly made tea without the use of hands.
"Something ... is ... not ... right," Dunkel said.
Emery looked around. She checked the door and windows with her threads. "What do you mean? Everything is fine," Emery said, but Dunkel did not respond.
She became paranoid and laid a thread onto the door jams forming a basic weave and sticking it in place. It was a rudimentary compared to the weave on Dunkel, but she could make them. The only issue was the strength of her threads, and her basic weave design would not keep out someone with power.
Emery used her threads to lay a trip line in the hallway and another inside her door. She sat there breathing heavily when inspiration hit. She lifted the bucket filled with water from the leaky AC and hung it over the door.
"There," she said. But after a moment in consideration, she wondered how the bucket would stop an intruder unless they had some sort of rare weird aversion to water.
"Pulley," Dunkel said. She had not removed her threads from him in case he came round.
"What?" She replied.
"On bucket thread," he said and pointed.
Her mouth opened. He moved. Dunkel moved on his own. Forgetting the bucket and intruder, she asked him, "How did you move just now?"
Dunkel sat down, "Hard ... work," he replied. He sat slack as if he needed to rest.
Emery inspected him. Physically there was no difference, but when she examined the intricate threads which crisscrossed his body, she could see a disturbance where she had been moving him. The push and pull of her own threads had disturbed the weave.
She wasn't stupid. Dunkel was kept in the catacombs for a reason. He could possibly be dangerous. Or at least a forgotten experiment. It was possible he was a golem created by a great Threadmaster from the past. One who had since died and they packed Dunkel away and forgotten him.
"What are you, Dunkel?" She asked. He was becoming more responsive and communicative. It was possible he could provide more information than his previous confused stutter.
"I'm ... don't know," he replied.
"What do you know Dunkel?" Emery asked. He obviously knew things like what her name meant. His warning that something was wrong and his ambiguous advice about a pulley for the bucket.
While waiting for his response, she quickly looked up a pulley on her phone. Her knowledge of building was fairly limited to zero. While she watched a youtube video on the history and application of pulleys, Dunkel finally answered.
"Dunkel knows things," he replied, but he sounded confused. "I am sealed," he added finally and with a great effort he stood and walked towards her. He touched her chest as she sat on the bed facing him. "You are sealed too," he stated before slumping down onto the bed in exhaustion.
"Okay," she replied flippantly with a smile. Her brain had been working on the pulley concept while she was watching Dunkel and she was ready to give it a try.
Emery attached a thread to the bottom of the bucket before creating a cylinder shape with a weave and attaching it to the top of the wall above the door. She then hooked the thread from the bottom of the bucket over the cylinder and back down to the door.
Now if someone opened the door, the bucket would tip automatically.
She looked at Dunkel. "You know. You aren't as dumb as you look," she said with a laugh before adding. "That's not a high bar you are a teddy bear after all." She gave Dunkel a playful tickle to show him she was only joking.
Her phone pinged interrupting her attack. Not being the world's most popular person she received few notifications. Emery inspected her phone and noticed it was from NYHA. It was her certificate of power registration. It was all she needed to get a job, other than a job itself.
"Dunkel," She announced. "I don't think we are under attack so I should go out and try and get a job." She considered his words and her reaction. "I really should take your words of doom in context in the future."
Dunkel was confused most of the time therefore when he said something was not right she really shouldn't have reacted like they were under an immediate threat.
"Live and learn," she said as she undid the threads on her door and traps.
Emery was about to head out the door, "Bye Dunkel," she said, "I'll be back soon."
"Don't leave me... alone..," he pleaded.
His words broke Emery's heart. She was a softy when it came down to it. That was one of the reasons others walked all over her. They saw her kindness as a weakness.
"Ok. Ok," She said lifting him up. A prospective employer would have to know what she was. "You're just making things hard though," She scolded him.
<break>
Trapesing from a prospective place of employment to another with a teddy bear in tow would normally draw stares. But this was New York, home of the strange and weird.
Emery's head barely turned as a man in an animal onsey jumped down the street on a pogo stick.
"See we're almost normal Dunkel," she informed the bear. It was an unwritten rule that people with powers did not flaunt them in public. Not unless it was in the course of duty. They were taught not to upset the general population and flaunting of powers created fear and anxiety with the mundane.
She approached the supermarket which was only a few blocks from her apartment building and sighed. "Not glamorous, but it's a wage," she informed Dunkel.
The draft was in a few weeks as the Summer break drew to a close. It was her last summer break, as she wasn't in school anymore. The Hero Academy was not like normal schools, it prepared her for what was considered normal hero occupations, and in the worst-case scenario, the power discipline subjects led to the registration which allowed her to participate in normal society legally.
"Can I see the manager?" She asked the lady behind the counter.
"Sure. But why?" The lady asked peering at the walking bear.
"I'm after a job," Emery said.
The lady replied, "No need to get the manager then. You need to fill in an online application and when we are hiring HR might contact you."
"Where's the online application?" Emery asked.
"Just search Foodmart and application. Can't miss it," the lady behind the counter replied.
"How do I apply for this store?" Emery asked there were hundreds if not thousands of Foodmarts.
"Just put in your address. HR will work it out," the lady replied, and her tone indicated she was losing patience.
"Okay. Thanks," Emery said before leaving.
She messaged her mom telling her she was trying to get a job. Her mom sent her money for food and rent every week on a Tuesday, and it was barely enough to get by. Her mother wasn't rich either. It was all she could afford.
**Mom: why don't you just come home?
**Emery: the lease goes to the end of July. The draft is before that, so I may as well stay here until we find out what is happening. If I don't get drafted, I will come home. Ok.
**Mom: ok. Call me later. I want to hear about your week. And send photos of your graduation. There was nothing on Facebook.
**Emery: ok. And mom, we don't use facebook anymore that's for old people.
<break>
"Three weeks and no job Dunkel!" Emery expressed her frustration to her best and only real friend. An animated teddy bear.
The bear shrugged.
"Oh. I see you take every opportunity to use your new move," she took out some of her frustration on the bear. She considered. Briefly this may be the reason she had few friends. As soon as she got one they had to put up with all her shit.
"More power," Dunkel stated. Despite some of his newfound freedoms, they could only communicate when she had threads attached to him. Albeit one was enough. He could walk around by himself now. He just wasn't very fast, and stairs were a challenge.
"What do mean? How is more power going to get me a job?" Emery asked.
"Defeat your enemies," Dunkel said.
"What enemies?!" Emery said in frustration. Dunkel was beginning to have a one-track mind. Although he did have good ideas on occasion. And while Bree, Brittany and the rest of her followers may be enemies, they weren't the type that Dunkel meant.
Dunkel lifted his palm, and minuscule spark of black smoke wafted from its centre.
"What is that?" Emery exclaimed.
"Power," Dunkel replied as if it was obvious.
Dunkel ran his dumpy run across the surface of the bed. "Do the twist," he ordered.
Emery sighed. Even animated teddy bears were her superior.
Dunkel had been encouraging her to twist four threads together. The action required a high level of finesse compared to what she was used to but she was improving with the silly games they played.
The only explanation he offered when she quizzed him regarding his suggestions was a simple statement "more power". He had no idea where he got these concepts from.
Dunkel pointed to the bed.
"No Dunkel. I cannot lift the bed it's too heavy," Emery replied.
Dunkel shook his head and teased. "I so poor. Sob."
He was goading her. Throwing her own complaints back in her face. "Fine!" Emery said loudly. She aggressively attached the twisted thread to two of the four legs of the bed and flipped the side Dunkel was standing.
To her astonishment, the bed was light as a feather, and with a crash, the left side hit the ceiling. Her neighbours immediately started yelling and banging the floor back in her direction.
"Oh shit," she breathed.
Dunkel had flown off the bed towards the far wall. Emery halted his flight millimetres before he hit the wall with a mental tug on the thread attached to him.
"More power," he said smugly as she sat him back down on the messed up bed.