I frenetically sketched in my notebook. I had a stacks of them. One waiting to be used, and a second one full of calculations and number crunching.

“I helped you to get a top of the line tablet and you’re drawing with a pencil, in a lined notebook?” Bro teased as he propped himself against the table that was my desk, my center of operations.

“Mark has been showing me how to use a drawing program, but I’m still faster with a pencil,” I admitted.

As I spoke he picked up my GeoTalker, that’s what I started calling the device. He lifted the box frame with both hands— it wasn’t very large. A collection of vacuum tubes and coils wired with a couple of signal LEDs, a mismash of early twentieth century engineering with modern parts. I had used what I could from that fortuitous flea market find, and anything else I could get my hands on.

The pine wood frame— more like a housing cage— was sanded smooth, but I hadn’t had the inclination to stain the wood. Over all it was the size of a hefty cat, and it was showing signs of heat damage with several scorched areas.

“What are you drawing up?” Bro asked, his attention on the GeoTalker as he twisted it back and forth. His hands were just in my periferal vision. They were large and strong, appearing to be perfectly capable. His knees were also in my peripheral, but I was choosing to ignor them. They were nice knees and it took a certain about of will power to not ogle.

Besides, I din’t want to ogle Bro. It’s not that he wasn’t worth a good long gander, he wasn’t Collin. Only Collin wasn’t the one who came to see what I was working on. Collin never made comments about me using a pencil instead of the tablet I spent a pretty penny on. I thought for certain Collin would have been the one interested in communicating with lava. But Bro was the one who came and leaned on my desk and showed off his knees.

To be fair, no one was showing off their knees. Just outside of the heat suits, everyone tended toward wearing shorts. Myself included. Only, I was showing off my knees in a deliberate attempt to gain a certain someone’s attention. I didn’t know why I bothered.