Ivy wasn't feeling so keen on Mechanicsburg anymore. For a city that promised a nearly unending supply of tool kits, metal gears, and more wrenches and screwdrivers than she could shake a stick at, they sure had a lot of silly rules. What was the point of having all that great stuff if you weren't going to share fairly with female Sparks and the Jaeger companions? 

Still, she didn't feel like arguing anymore. She wanted to [i]go[/i], the [i]move[/i], to [i]be[/i] anywhere but sitting still again. She was beginning to feel restless, and she wasn't sure how much time she could spend rebuilding the engine before Jötx tried to ruin her fun again. 

She started to wonder off again, wondering whether she could find anything of use that wasn't buried in dust or half eaten away by copper-colored rust -- but she froze as Jötz began speaking again. 

Jacob Ludd? 

She was almost [i]certain[/i] she had heard the name before, though she couldn't, for the life of her, remember where or even when. Motorhum hadn't exactly been a bustling city, and certainly wasn't Spark friendly. It only followed that all the atrocities that came with Sparks -- even those, like the Canallers, that weren't directly linked -- weren't much liked or discussed either, save by more liberal parents, and even then, only in the confines of crowded children's rooms, meant to frighten children into staying home to take care of their ailing, aging families. Rather like the toads outside the village walls. 

Though that had ended up far worse than Ivy might have anticipated. 

That, coupled with the involuntary shiver she gave at the sound of the name, and the way the tiny hairs on the back of her neck went rigid, almost as if they themselves were fearful of the ghost of some unknown moniker, ought to have prodded what little intuitive effort Ivy had into some semblance of being. But as of late, all her intuition had gone into building any number of bombs. So. No help there. 

Then the moment was past, and Ivy was shrugging, thinking she'd probably gotten the name from her brother's old stories. He'd once traded a week's supply of eggs to the neighbor for a tattered and dog-eared copy of [i]The Heterodyne Tales, Vol. 2[/i]. The illustrations had been so graphic (and the eggs so missed), Mama Petra had beat him until he couldn't even help with the chores and had to make them up the next month. But he'd kept the book, and he and Ivy had read from it every night until the pages had fallen apart in their hands. 

"I think I read a story about him once," Ivy said errantly, still frowning slightly, trying to remember just what the story had been about. Why it made her stomach feel a little uneasy. Then she shrugged and grinned. "I bet [i]I[/i] can get it open," she said, then hesitated. "But maybe you should stand somewhere else. I think you get in the way of my exploding things a lot."