Cubist

Noting the feline's excessively slim build, Miss Wells said, "I rather think you shan't have any difficulty clambering about the undercarriage, friend Jubatus. I shall have hot water, soap, and towels waiting for you upon your return, inasmuch as it is likely that you shall be in somewhat intimate contact with wheel-grease and the like." "Thanks," Jubatus replied, and with his characteristic blur, he left the safe, warm interior of the train... ...only to return in a small number of minutes, as measured by the clock. Miss Wells, as good as her word, had used this time to set up an impromptu bathing facility, and the grime which fouled a goodly portion of the feline's fur indicated that her work would be appreciated. As Jubatus cleansed himself, he reported his findings, such as they were: "Of our top five suspects, Willowbreak's the only one who's left the train anytime recently... Not sure about the time-frame... I need to practice more with this nose," he growled, annoyed at his own lack of competence in this specific area. "Got to be within the past few days, though... Didn't detect any residual scent from the corpse on Willowbreak's scent-traces... Not that that means a whole lot, what with all the exhaust and contamination..." He paused. "Hrrm... Willowbreak's scent is not on the outer surface of either of the last two cars on this train... Whatever he was up to... we can be pretty confident that he wasn't just furtively sneaking around your machine." At this point, Jubatus scanned his fur with unsympathetic eyes, and sniffed at what had been the worst-begrimed areas on his body. "Pfft! That's about as good as I can get it," he said in a semi-disquieting tone. "Pretty sure no normal nose is gonna pick up on the remaining residue, at least."

And in the fullness of TIme, a rather unusual person approached and joined the queue: Tall (6'1") and inhumanly slim (102 lbs), he was covered in black-spotted yellowish fur, with a well-developed muzzle and rounded ears on top of his head. Had it not been for his bipedal posture, the multiply-pocketed khaki vest he wore, and the palmtop he carried in one pawlike hand whilst scribbling on its screen with the stylus in his other pawlike hand, any onlooker could easily have mistaken him for a common -- non-sentient -- cheetah. The feline was fully aware of his surroundings, but his overall demeanor was not friendly; he displayed no sign whatsoever of willingness to interact with anyone on a social level. He wasn't overtly hostile, either, but with his claws and fangs...

Okay, I caught Willowbreak's scent on the outer surface of the train. Coolness. Was the corpse's scent mixed in with it? (as in, if Willowbreak did the deed, his hands might have carried some of his victim's scent, and maybe he could have left that on the outer surface with his own scent)? Also, *is* there sufficient clearance below the train for Jube to fit down there?

Jubatus, being a hardcore jerk, could be interesting/amusing in a social-heavy thread. Of course, it does kind of beg the question of what the heck a speedster is doing on public transit... but I can think of two possible reasons off the top of my head, and there are any number of other potential candidates. One: One of the things Jube does in his day job is, he's a freelance technical writer. The Freedom City Transit Authority could have hired him to re-do some of its documents (website, route maps, etc etc). Either the FCTA insists on any such tech writer getting 'hands on' experience with the transit system, or else fussbudget perfectionist Jube insisted on doing that just because. Two: As per Jube's 'Nature of the Beast' complication, he really shouldn't be going bipedal, because his skeleton & etc are all designed for quadrupedal posture. So maybe his personal physician ordered him to take the bus everywhere for N days solid (because that way, he's going to spend a lot of time sitting down, which would take a lot of stress off his much-abused lower back and give him a chance to heal up some from the long-term stress/damage of bipedalness). Three: Something else I couldn't, or at least didn't, think of. Yes? No?

It is indeed (a part of) one of the Complications on Jube's character sheet. At this point, I've decided to leave the sheet as it stands; I was worried that Jube's crunch didn't match up with his fluff, but I'm now thinking that I was led astray by my poor grasp of MnM game mechanics. So it goes...

Still not sure that splitting the one Container into two Containers will be a valid solution. But if it is, it occurs to me that this would be a summat better representation of what I'm after: So: Yes? No? Does this pass muster?

Jube's Complications specify that the cheetah is permanently stuck at a tempo of 6, and needs to use his Timeshift to slow down in order to interact with normal-speed people. However, Jube's powers, as listed on the character sheet, don't seem to reflect that. This is a problem, and here's my first try at a solution: Does this pass muster?

At this point, Jubatus has escaped from ArcheTech, and is roaming freely in Freedom City. This means feral!Jube can, at least potentially, encounter pretty much anybody or anything in Freedom! So if you think your character might benefit from an encounter with a playful, superfast kitten, come on into the IC thread!

The cheetah padded through the biggester empty space, indulging its curiosity at every turn. There were so many interesting scents to explore! Some of them smelled good, and some of them smelled bad, but all of them were new to the cheetah, so that was alright. There were a lot of tallthings, too, and the cheetah occasionally chose one to circle around, getting a close look (and sniff) at it. This was easy, because the tallthings were so very slow. As the cheetah examined more of the tallthings, it begin to suspect that maybe they didn't like being examined... but it couldn't figure out why that might be. If it was hurting the tallthings, that would explain why they didn't like being examined. But the cheetah wasn't hurting them! It wasn't hurting anything! The tallthings were very strange. The cheetah was hungry, and grew more hungry, as it padded through the biggester empty space. Every so often it caught scent of food, so it tried to get closer to the food. This was harder than it should be, because the food-scent came and went, and the cheetah couldn't figure out why... ...and then the tallthings began to smell like fear. The cheetah could recognize that scent, because most of the tallthings it examined smelled like fear, but now, even tallthings it hadn't examined were starting to smell like fear. Something bad must be coming! The cheetah decided it had better get to the food before the something bad arrived. If it had food, the cheetah could outrun any bad thing; it was absolutely certain of that. Before it got close to the food, the cheetah found itself falling asleep... no! It wasn't tired, not even a little bit! The something bad must be making it sleep, because the something bad couldn't possibly catch the cheetah while it was awake, so the something bad had to be making it sleep! The cheetah didn't want to be killed and eaten. It really didn't want to be killed and eaten. Now the cheetah ran in earnest. The world got even slower as the cheetah ran through the biggester empty space. It didn't know where it was going, but it knew it had to run. If the cheetah just kept running, surely it would find a way out from inside the walls that completely surrounded the biggester empty space? It didn't know what was outside the walls, but it did know that just as it was inside the walls, the something bad was inside the walls, too. So the cheetah ran; sometimes it had to run up walls and across ceilings to avoid slamming into the slow, slow tallthings, so it did that. Once or twice, the cheetah changed course because it caught the scent of the weird-smelling tallthing and it didn't want to run into the weird-smelling tallthing again. Maybe the something bad was working with the weird-smelling tallthing? The cheetah didn't know, and it didn't want to find out the hard way. The last time the cheetah got a whiff of the weird-smelling tallthing, it changed course again -- straight into a dead end! The cheetah really, really didn't want to be killed and eaten. But it couldn't go forward because of the walls in the way! It couldn't go back, either, not with the weird-smelling tallthing behind it! Maybe... maybe if the cheetah ran fast enough, it could break through the walls in the way? In its adrenaline-fueled sprint, the cheetah had already, without conscious awareness, activated its Timeshift power. Now, faced with what it believed to be certain death, the cheetah pushed its Timeshift harder than it had ever been pushed before -- harder than it ever would have thought to even try, had it been in its right mind. Since the cheetah wasn't in its right mind, it pushed its Timeshift beyond the limits of sanity, not slowing down as its power wrenched at the fabric of the space/time continuum so hard that the cheetah wasn't entirely in this Universe... and it passed through the wall in front of it, passed through all the walls that enclosed the biggester empty space. So it was that the cheetah entered the biggestest empty space of all! The roof was so high it couldn't tell where the roof was, and there was only one light overhead, a very bright light that hurt the cheetah's eyes when it looked up. And there were lots of interesting scents, more than the cheetah could remember ever having smelled! The cheetah was very, very hungry now. Fortunately, the uncountable new scents it was smelling included food...

Hmmm... looks like that 10 PP will cover 6 ranks in Speed plus 4 ranks of Quickness. So feral!Jube will run with that plus the 4 ranks in Insubstantial. I have no idea what sort of scanners/sensors ArcheTech and/or Dok have running at any given moment, but if those scanners/sensors include anything that can detect dimensional disturbances, feral!Jube's escape might well light 'em up pretty good?

Scroll down to the end of this post to see what I've concluded feral!Jube should be doing right now; all the other stuff before it is just commentary... The silent alarm: Although feral!Jube's ears can probably detect the high-frequency sounds produced by operating computers, that sound will be fairly quiet (especially since most/all displays are likely to be flat-panel LCDs, rather than bulky, noisy CRTs), and it's also going to be a continuing background noise, so I can't see the kitteh gaining any sort of warning therefrom. How sad for the kitteh. As for the sudden 'wave' of fear-scent, yeah, feral!Jube's sensitive nose would pick up on that. He wouldn't know why people are scared, but the stunner attack which follows nigh-immediately will give him a clue. An erroneous clue, to be sure, but whaddaya gonna do? Defense/Toughness tradeoff: Okay, got it. [adds "buy +2 in Defense" to Jube's to-do list] Immediate response: Okay, it looks like burning an HP for instant recovery is the way to go, and fuggeddabout re-rolling or the Dodge thing. "Make it so!" Clarification on the Timeshift: As per the "Too Darn Fast" Complication on Jube's character sheet, a tempo of 6 (that being 6 times faster than normal) is the cheetah's default state; he can't really interact with normal-speed people unless he uses the Timeshift to slow down to their tempo of 1. Yes, this means Jube creates a (hopefully minor) temporal disturbance, and can be detected by anything that senses the proverbial "distortion in the space/time continuum", whenever he's talking to normal-speed people. In the current situation, feral!Jube doesn't (yet) know that he has a Timeshift power, so he can't intentionally switch it on. Unintentionally switching it on, such as might happen during a panicky, adrenaline-fueled omighodigottaRUNAWAY!!! sprint, is of course another matter entirely... The "Overthruster"/escape trick: Doing it as a power stunt means feral!Jube can't be using his superspeed at the same time? Hm. Ruddy game mechanics... but okay, if that's how it's gotta be, that's how it's gotta be. How things look from feral!Jube's point of view: He's just poking around like a curious kitten, when suddenly, there's a minor 'wave' of fear-scent in the air. He's clueless about why people are afraid, of course, but when the stunners hit him, he concludes that this icky assault is the reason why. One adrenaline surge (plus 1 burned HP) later, feral!Jube is running away as fast as he can -- instinctive, reflexive Timeshift up to his maximum tempo of 40, plus Move All-Out for 4* the velocity. He'll be running on walls and ceilings as needed in order to avoid smacking into any person/robot/whatever that may be in the halls as he goes, because running into stuff hurts. In this panic-stricken rush, feral!Jube has no idea whatsoever where he is; he's just following his nose and getting AWAY from the badthing back there. It's possible that he might run across Dok at one or more points during this mad rush; if so, the Dok's weird scent (and perhaps also the Dok's gravimetric belt, whose continuum-distorting functions could make feral!Jube feel funny?) encourages feral!Jube to choose a different path every time. After a time, feral!Jube finds himself in a dead-end corridor -- and when he stops & turns around, he notices that weird-smelling Dok is right behind him! Aaackkk! Run Away!!! Fight-or-flight FTW, and feral!Jube unconsciously pushes his Timeshift beyond all previous limits for an Insubstantial 4 power-stunt, and thus manages to run straight through the wall as he flees Dok. Since feral!Jube's default tempo is 6, and cheetahs can hit 65-70 MPH at top speed, it probably doesn't matter whether feral!Jube is close to any exterior wall or not; he's outside, and he's going to have a grand old time in Freedom City... Yes? No?

Just how silent is that Silent Alarm the Dok activated? I ask because Jube's Ultrasonic Hearing may (or may not) be able to pick up on it... Fortitude save, right. Jube's got +6 there, and... Fortitude save vs. stunners (1d20 + 6=10) is a failed FORT save. [checking Ultimate Power book, as this is the first real combat Jube's been in, and I want to be sure I'm not screwing up somewhere] Looks like the kitteh is officially stunned, thanks to missing the roll by 9... hmm. He's got a +2 Defense / -2 Toughness tradeoff. If that applies here, he misses the roll by 11, hence is unconscious. Well, we don't want to end Jube's 'rampage' this soon, right? So I think Jube will burn one or two Hero Point(s) here. Looking at the Core book, I think I've got three options. I can burn an HP or so to... [*:1bgfcu5r]...Dodge. This doubles Jube's dodge bonus for the round. Does Jube's +2 Defense from that tradeoff apply here? If so, his defense number should be 34, in which case the roll of 32 is a miss. At least that's the theory, anyway... [*:1bgfcu5r]...Improve the roll. No point to this unless that -2 Toughness from the tradeoff applies. If it does,Jube re-rolls the FORT save vs. stunners (1d20 + 6 - 2=5) -- since the HP-fueled re-roll adds 10 to a rolled result of 1-10, this will be a 15, hence missing by only 4, and Jube ends up dazed rather than stunned. [*:1bgfcu5r]...Recover. Doing this makes a stunned condition evaporate instantly; alas, the Core rules don't say that it works on a dazed condition, which may be relevant. I'm unsure if burning Hero Points is actually applicable here, and I also am uncertain if doing so will actually make any difference to the outcome. I hope it does, but this is the first time I've had to grapple with MnM's rules for taking damage in combat... Immediate consequences: If worse comes to worst, and Jube is indeed KO'ed by the stunners, it would be nice if his high-speed metabolism (and/or Regeneration...) let him come to his senses before anybody arrives to contain him; if the metabolism/Regeneration don't do that, well, the kitteh is hosed. Contrariwise, if the combusting HP(s) yield the results I'm hoping for, Jube is up and running just because. If Jube ends up fully mobile, he's going to try to escape -- All-Out Movement, with the accompanying effect on his Defense bonus, plus Jube's Evasion feat. I don't think he'll deliberately use his Timeshift (which ability he probably isn't aware of at this point), but since every fiber of his being will be concentrated on Getting The Heck Outta Dodge, the Timeshift will switch on by instinctive reflex. And... oooh! Crazy idea here: Since Jube's Timeshift power manipulates the space/time continuum, what if he can do the "oscillation overthruster" trick from Buckaroo Banzai? If this is allowable at all, it's a Power Stunt that Jube burns (yet another?) Hero Point for; it's something that normal!Jube will not be aware of, nor will he have any reason to try it later (unless Doktor A. tells Jube about it, at least); and it's how feral!Jube breaks out into Freedom City at large...

...and the cheetah woke up. It didn't know where it was, and even if it did know, it wouldn't have cared, because there was some kind of very annoying sound that made its ears hurt. It wasn't alone; there were two tallthings in the same room, the bigger of which had a weird scent the cheetah didn't care for at all, but the smaller one smelled okay. The cheetah moved as far away from the very annoying sound as was possible in this room. It was operating at its default tempo of six times faster than normal, and it couldn't help but notice how terribly slow the two tallthings were. The weird-smelling tallthing carried a very annoying soundmaker in its forepaws; the cheetah didn't want to be around the weird-smelling tallthing any longer than it had to. The cheetah looked around the room, looking for exits. It saw a number of flat panels of various sizes, each one of which had an out-sticking bit. Most of these flat panels were up against walls, but one of the flat panels was sticking out at an angle, with an empty place beyond it. The cheetah wondered if the biggest flat panel would have a biggest empty place beyond it -- maybe even biggest enough to get away from the very annoying sound? It moved around the room, trying to move the flat panels so it could see the empty placed beyond them, but its claws couldn't make the flat panels stick out at any angle. It pretty much ignored the tallthings as it moved around them, because anything that slow didn't matter. The cheetah's claws could make the flat panels go jigglerattle, and it could hear the jigglerattle most strongly in the out-sticking bits. The cheetah sniffed at the out-sticking bits: There was a lot of tallthing scent on them, much more than was on the rest of the flat panels. The cheetah looked at the weird-smelling tallthing, then at an out-sticking bit, then at its own forepaws. It raised one forepaw up to grab hold of the out-sticking bit on the biggest flat panel. The out-sticking bit wasn't quite solid; it actually moved a little, moved in place! The cheetah experimentally twisted at the out-sticking bit to see what would happen, and then there was a click and the biggest flat panel swung out at an angle. Yes! There was a biggest empty place beyond -- no, wait, it was a biggester empty place! The cheetah ran out into the biggester empty place as fast as it could. Very quickly, the very annoying sound faded away into nothing. There were lots of other sounds, and lots of other sights, and lots of other scents, and lots more tallthings, but at least there wasn't any very annoying sound, and all the new things were very interesting! Still operating at its default tempo of six, the cheetah moved around and through this curious new (albeit terribly slow) world, poking its nose into anything that caught its attention...

Jubatus will do the Take 20 thing for his Notice check, since he, like Blueshift, has Quickness. Jube's super-senses include Ultrasonic Hearing, and tactile-derived Motion Sense based on detecting/analyzing air currents. If the enemy has been around earlier and left some sort of traces, it may be worth noting that Jube has 'Acute' and 'Tracking' on his Normal Olfactory Sense. Jube's Initiative roll will be normal -- except, of course, that he's got a honkin' big pile of the Improved Initiative feat, on top of his massive DEX, hence his Initiative bonus is pretty ridiculous. Notice 'roll': 20 + 9 (Notice skill) - 2 (modifier for circumstance) = 27 Initiative roll: 1d20 + 7 (DEX bonus) + 24 (Improved Initiative) =32

A couple of observations which you may find relevant, Shaen... First: Any fight which starts out by making a non-trivial chunk of Freedom freeze over just before a major storm pops up out of nowhere is probably going to be noticed by... well, pretty much any hero in Freedom who's awake... and it wouldn't be at all implausible for a good-sized chunk of that group to drop in on the fight. Second: Jubatus, being a speedster with a seriously weird sleep pattern, can plausibly make an appearance in any Freedom City neighborhood at any time.

"As designed," Jay called back in a tone of voice... that was just too alien to interpret. Hmmm... maybe he can help? Jay thought. Not a sure thing, but anyone who stinks of oil that bad probably works with gears and such, and since he's a hero-type, it's not a bad bet that he can tinker with other flavors of machinery, too. And then the cheetah moved over in front of Push, leaving his Timeshift completely off whilst he was en route and therefore 'only' moving at his default tempo of six times faster than normal in transit. When he arrived, Jay downshifted to the normal tempo of 1 and asked, "You any good with electronics and/or computers?"

[nods] Given the way you described KoS's Cambodian experiences, it would be surprising if the poor guy didn't have bunches & bunches of lingering psychological issues (see also: post-traumatic stress disorder, among other things). Might be good for a Complication? Or not; it all depends whether you want to go there with your character, natch.

[nods] Not a problem. Jube, being the paranoid perfectionist he is, spent a tiny chunk of the night patrolling the building sites anyway, just on general principles; he's trying to earn a level in Crazy Prepared, you see. And if the Big Bad did some prep work on the place as part of his/her/its machinations, it's possible that Jube might detect (some of?) that prep work. Or not, I dunno... [shrug] It's possible, maybe even likely, that at least one of the three sleepless PCs will hear the klak-klakk of Jay's practice session with the prosthetic 'glove' Blue gave him. Hmmm... would that sound trigger a flashback in Marceau? [evil grin]

Jay Xavier yawned and stretched as he woke up from his second catnip of this evening. It was an autonomic reaction -- he never had been able to avoid that feline ritual when he woke up, and he hoped to Morpheus that none of the people he was accompanying saw it. On the plus side, he was always at his default tempo of 6 -- six times quicker than normal -- when he did the yawn-and-stretch thing, so there was a decent chance that anybody who did see it wouldn't recognize what they were looking at. He hoped. Jay upshifted for a superspeed patrol of the area -- the entire area that they'd be building on, plus 50 meters further on all sides. It was just a precaution; he didn't actually expect to find any evidence of hostile activity, but considering how messed-up Haiti was, not to mention the psychotic freaks who constituted the environmental movement's lunatic fringe, he greatly preferred to err on the side of caution. Okay, he always preferred to err on the side of caution, regardless of what the current circumstances might be. But even so, it just made sense to be watchful. Didn't it? As it happened, the cheetah didn't find anything untoward. Except maybe the fire, with Push, Blueshift, and Marceau around it... no, eavesdropping from a safe distance proved that those three just weren't sleepy. It simply didn't occur to Jay to sit down and join their conversation, so instead, he returned to his own bivouacking spot and resumed his attempts to tame the unruly 'glove' Blueshift had improvised for him. Klak-KLAKK. Klak-KLAKK. Klak-KLAKK...

"Thanks," was Jay's heartfelt reply. He recovered from his funk with remarkable speed, and was back to his usual baseline self by the time Doktor Archeville began fitting the EEG helmet to his head. Jay 's ears pricked up at these words. Ever since the day he tore up those five muggers, he'd always been worried (if not "terrified") about how much of his mind had been overwritten by cheetah instincts; his therapist, Ed Halstonne, argued that any animalistic impulses he might have felt were most likely the result of secondary shaping effects from his new body, more or less a self-inflicted mindgame rather than the instincts he so feared. For his part, Jay still wasn't more than half-convinced, if even that much... but here, finally, was hard evidence! Unless his cheetah-instincts didn't show up on the brain scan because they simply weren't being triggered by anything at the moment... Jay nodded. "Go for it," he said. "And, hrrm, what if I got some, hrrr, 'atavistic' brain circuits that just aren't active... at the moment..?" The two scientists exchanged looks; Rao wore an expression of surprise, while Archeville's composed face suggested that he'd already thought of that before Jay had. "Perhaps... the next scans could be active, rather than passive?" Rao suggested tentatively. "Apply a calibrated stimulus to a specific region of Mr. Xavier's brain, and observe how his neurons react to that known stimulus?" The Doktor was amenable to this notion, as (more importantly) was Jay...

Jubatus' sleep pattern was... odd, by human standards. Rather than one solid bloc of eight hours, he took a nontrivial number of catnaps, scattered more-or-less evenly throughout the day. He assumed he still dreamed, but this was an assumption, as he couldn't remember any dreams he might have had since the fur coat got permanently installed. In any case, Jube spent a good bit of his evenings awake while normal people were asleep. Tonight was no exception; he couldn't help but notice that Push and Blueshift were having trouble with nightmares or something. Well, if they wanted any help with it, they could presumably ask. For his part, the cheetah was practicing with the 'glove' Blueshift had gimmicked up for him. KLAKK-KLAKK! Yes, he could get it to snap open and snap closed on command. Sadly, that was all he could get it to do -- it didn't seem to want to move at less than its maximum speed, nor exert less than the maximum level of force its motors/'muscles' could generate. An on/off switch without any volume control. If the thing's sensors were designed to work with human-normal nerve impulses, that might actually be the best he could do with it... well, what the hell. Tomorrow would be soon enough to give the 'glove' a workout in more-or-less real-world circumstances. In the meantime, he'd see if he could get the 'glove' to behave in a more controllable manner.

Jube has a host of psychological issues; this isn't a Complication for him, but perhaps it should be? Anywho -- if there's some sort of Malign Influenceâ„¢ giving people bad dreams, the kitteh might well be affected by it. On t'other hand, Jube's brain is far from human-standard, so it's possible that whatever-it-is just can't affect Jube, any more than it can affect a raven or eagle? And on the gripping hand, if we're talking Voodoo, perhaps that Agassou character I mentioned in Jube's first post in this thread might be taking a personal interest, with who-knows-what effect on the cheetah... I have no idea what's happening here, but it may be worth noting that Jube has a semi-decent suite of Super-Senses -- Motion Sense (tactile, based on detecting/analyzing air currents in his vicinity), Danger Sense (derived from Motion Sense), Low-Light Vision, Acute and Tracking on his olfactory sense, and Ultrasonic Hearing. It may also be worth notice that Jube has +9 in Notice. If Jube has reason to think that Something Is Out There, he'll Take 20 on a Notice check (yay Quickness!); otherwise, a standard 1D20 Notice check (1d20+9=10) may or may not yield extra data on whatever-it-is.

Apologies, Quote, but I'm not ready to lighten up on Jube's Complications just yet, so the 'replacement hand' will only be a temporary thing for the feline.

Having previously noted Blueshift's behavioral quirks, Jubatus wasn't terribly shocked when she grabbed at his forepaw -- One more datapoint for her profile, he did not say aloud -- and probed at its various digits and joints and so on, so he went along with it. The feline was, however, surprised that she had any device on hand even marginally suitable for the purpose of shoring up his forepaws' deficiencies in fine control: It's not the sort of thing that's likely to come up under normal circumstances, so why the heck is she... carrying... Oh. Right. Mirror image, Jube thought. She's got my fetish for overpreparedness; wonder what other traits we share? Jubatus accepted the device almost hesitantly; as a firm believer that 'anything which seems too good to be true probably is', he reflexively rejected the notion that this spur-of-the-moment gizmo could possibly live up to its press releases. But... she is a gadgeteer... so maybe... "Hrrr... it'd be nice to think so..." Holding the free end of the thing's wire gingerly, Jube brought it up to his forehead -- and the pincers instantly snapped shut with a nasty KLAKK! He upshifted before Blue had time to notice the seeming malfunction... Okay, what's the deal here? Jube thought to himself. Worked fine when she tried it, so why not for me? What's different... oh, bloody hell. And Jubatus knew what was different about him: The Timeshift, which he needed to turn on just to interact with normal-speed people at their tempo of 1. His Time-field didn't extend more than a few inches from his body; that meant the gizmo's wire was only partially contained within his Time-field, and the signals it carried varied in speed by a factor of 6 over a linear space of a few inches. Right: Synchronization issues. No wonder the gizmo locked up on me! Obvious solution: Make sure the wire stayed close to his skin at all times, so that no part of it was ever hanging loose at any moment. Fine: A few feet of Ace bandage from my first aid kit should do the job. And... ...it worked. The pincers did indeed snap open and closed at his unspoken command -- KLAKK-KLAKK.

Scent-search of the train's outer surface: If Quickness-plus-Take-20 is applicable, Jube will Take 20 on this little feat. As noted in the post, there are some non-trivial negative modifiers on this roll, so feel free to just declare "nope, you couldn't smell anything other than the sharp tang of burned coal" or whatevder the engine's exhaust happens to be.