Jinny nodded a bit at Mikron’s explanation of his technology. She understood most of the words, but not what they meant when used together. But she sure wasn’t going to mention that. Feeling dumb was deeply unpleasant for her, something she tried to avoid. But to his question about flight, she answered truthfully.

“Well, I can fly.” She said with some pride. The part about not being able to get particularly high was left out. “I just think it’d be nice to have a backup if I can’t or don’t want to use my powers.” She jerked a thumb at Slade. “He says to always have a con- con…” Why did her uncle have to use large words she could not spell. “Contingency plan. Meaning the jetpack is plan B.” 

“I’ve built a few things myself. Some small closed loop robots. Drop delivery coin sorters, homebrewed Gantry motosweep with a built in harness. Function over form, nothing pretty like your kit. My favorite one helps me organize.” 

She had help with those, because she was not yet old or large enough to operate the proper tools. (Finding a welding kit for children had proven moot, even on the internet.) But the design work and blueprints had been all from her own mind, and she was deeply proud of that. None of the kids at regular school would tolerate her talking about robots for very long, but she felt like this boy might listen. Even if he was older, he was firmly in the ‘very cool’ category so far.

She also didn’t miss the fact that neither she nor Slade was getting stared at in awe or in fear. That was a deep relief, as she was very much over being stared at like she had two heads. 

“If they let me in the mechanics class, I hope I see you there.” There was a happy smile on her face now. She seemed to have relaxed completely from her earlier ordeal.