Rely on April/Text Variations

Ordinary research

Experimental Object	Research Description
10	April covers a sheet of paper with equations, logos, demarcations that mean something in the language of the Red Science. It is too advanced for casual understanding, except for the phrase WHO BECOMES WHY, underscored several times.
40	April proposes the use of internal combustion, rather than a steam engine. Better acceleration. Lower fuel weight.
110	She writes notes. This is an older style of weapon than she uses. It will not blow anything up. But it belongs to a ritual time and a ritual place, and if used correctly, it will require almost no skill from the bearer.
120	She writes notes. You've made this blade before, and therefore she remembers how it's done. She always has that kind of thing written down.
130	This? Child's play. But she's willing to indulge you in constructing your own. It's obvious she considers it a bit of a training exercise for you.
140 - 160	She writes notes. She is intimately familiar with the Principles of violence. She engages in lengthy correspondence with your Principle while she works. Are they sharing notes?
210	Glassmen, cats, and certain varieties of serpent know how to enter the realm of Is-Not. For everyone else, the suspension of reality is more challenging.
220	[…] The place used to belong to the Khan of Silks, but Veils now neglects it[…] She thinks someone else may have the lease of it, and she has heard rumours of a factory. "Hot as the face of a Judgment" […] such power could be a threat to the Revolutionaries.
230	She circles a few locations on the map you're currently annotating. This sewer extends further than you think; that one is occupied by foxes...
240	She can make a handful of recommendations, based on her personal knowledge of all the best places in the Neath to hide unnoticed.
250	She handles the scrip gingerly, with gloves. "Burns well," she says. "Leaves less ash than you would expect."
260	April squints. Most of the Roof is an enduring mystery – even to the Calendar Council.
310	April makes faces. She plainly considers this kind of item to lie in the domain of Mr Fires; she would be more comfortable designing a nice violent bomb. But she does have some ideas, all the same.
320	April studies the designs intently. They come from Hell, but some of the principles can be expressed in terms of the Red Science. She makes many eager notes, only some of which are for your benefit.
410, 430	She […] in a few brief strokes outlines a plan: the Focused Albatross with a bomb where its body should be. It has such a wingspan and weighs so little that it could be a powerful delivery system. If, of course, one were inclined to build such a thing.
420	April diagrams the throats of the Warbler, a miraculous bit of plumbing, in which venom is generated by their speech, and carried away […] via tiny vessels. It is clear she regards this as the most dangerous and therefore the most interesting aspect […]
440	April measures and weighs the Storm-bird. Not a bird, she writes succinctly on a paper. Dream-projection. Rest of this being is much larger than we see here. She cannot elaborate beyond that, however.
450	April is delighted by the chance to dissect a subject that isn't presently moving, and identify the various toxins, venoms, biles, and other useful substances that might be extracted from the Pinewood Shark's labyrinthine anatomy.
460	April tests the extraction of toxins. Not useful as weaponry, she writes. Some power to dissolve soil. Not designed for skin. Unless the enemies are Clay Men?
465	April nearly takes the animal apart looking for poisons, venoms, stingers, horns, bone spurs, etc. She looks a bit disappointed with the results of her study.
470	Not a poison, April writes, about the drug. Animals appear hearty. "Hearty" is how she describes most experimental animals that are not currently dead.
480	April has nothing to say about the creature that laid this egg, or the method that made its shell so resilient. Might be good medicine, she speculates. That shade of red is sometimes good for the blood.
485	April has nothing to say about the creature that laid this egg, or the shapes that writhe within. Looks like a fish egg, she speculates. Maybe it tastes good?
510	She looks thoughtful, then makes several sketches: […] a tigress tries to take a bite of ox, and gets a mouthful of spines […] Less effective defence than a shell, […] Definitely not offensive, possibly not even defensive. Might be mating display.
540	She looks at you incredulously, then mimes clubbing someone with a length of amber-warped bone. It's plain she doesn't think much of your military imagination.
610	She looks at you incredulously, then mimes clubbing someone with the bone. It's plain she doesn't think much of your military imagination.
810 - 820	She looks at you incredulously, then mimes clubbing someone with the rock. It's plain she doesn't think much of your military imagination.
830	She stares at the sample in the vial, seemingly disappointed it doesn't smell anything like kerosene.
910	April covers a sheet of paper with explanations. Ordinary gunpowder is a matter of chemistry; Perfumed Gunpowder carries certain expectations about who is being exploded by whom.
920	This isn't weaponry, but in the course of her work April has had to learn some metallurgy. She writes instructive notes about furnaces and the proper amount of carbon to introduce to the iron.
930	April's notes explore the use of the drug as a poison, as a corrosive to destroy armour, or as an irritant to the lungs. She finds it disappointing in all regards.
940 - 950, 990	April has a shimmering halo of silver on the tip of her nose when you check on her. She has, however, made a sheaf of notes.
960	April's notes explore the use of the excretions as a poison, as a corrosive to destroy armour, or as an irritant to the lungs. She finds it disappointing in all regards.
970	April has nothing to say about the creature that laid this egg, or the method that made its shell so resilient. Hair not particularly flammable, she writes. Will look for other uses.
1010 - 1020	April squints at the page, then writes a number of annotations. These can't be right! Which means that they must be. Is that a non-existent number she just wrote down?
1210	April eats one of the Orange-Apples and distils several others into poisons of various levels of danger. Then she writes Correspondence symbols on the outside of one and causes it to erupt in a cloud of citrusy oil.
1340	She probes the creature's exterior, looking for some means of ingress. Perhaps a defensive outer shell? she writes.
1350	April knows more about weapons than about armour, but the topics are related. This piece impresses her. The substance is rare, and much stronger than it ought to be[…]. The surface is a bit shinier than one would like for a stealth mission[…].
1610	April smiles. She has made such a craft earlier, in the safety of her own mind. She produces a sturdy miniature, which comes with water-wheels, to purify the waters as it speeds down the river.

Red Science research

Experimental Object	Research Description
330	[…] The augmentation cup is […] a meticulous construct of jigsaw-puzzle components, machined to slide together without a gap. On their hidden, inner faces are sigils of the Correspondence. Changes to intensity […] Designed to enhance what is naturally present. […]
350	She focuses intently. The Red Science requires even more of her concentration than usual.
360	April writes you questions about the purpose of this device. What do you plan to do with people's femurs and skulls once you've copied them out? Is it meant to be applied to a form of sympathetic magic? […] she doubts the effectiveness of the method.
490	[…] Not an ordinary fossil, she writes. Manufactured. […] She goes […] and comes back with […] a tea rose. She leaves it overnight […] beside the aged egg. In the morning, the flower has […] altered: the petals are more primitive, the colours more garish […]
495	April spends the night hard at work. You come back to find her workbench. Three dead warblers. […] Diamond shards soaking in a glass, to get the blood off again. It's messy work keeping the site of incision open, is all she will say about the ordeal.
520 - 530	[…] BIGGER! she writes in her notes. And next to these exhortations are drawings of immense ribs […] the largest of these experiments would require a small star's worth of energy. But she is keenly seeking ways to bring make all this possible […]
980	Haven't tried the metal of these before, says April. But it's strange stuff. Need a Hellworm to mine the ore. It doesn't lawfully exist yet.
1030	April's approach to the Red Science is generally more practical than theoretical. What you are seeking now […] is partly new territory for her. But she is perennially finding ways in which she can apply these new discoveries, and linking them together […]
1040	April works much of the day and most of the night on the experiment. There are pages and pages of meticulous notes. At the bottom: The stars are b___ds.
1045	April works much of the day and most of the night disassembling and reassembling the bulb. There are pages and pages of meticulous notes, increasingly frustrated. At the bottom: Utterly wrongheaded. Why reinforce the laws we're already tied by?
1050	April looks at the drawings for a long time. It's Red Science. Where I would use Correspondence signs, they've translated. This passage concerns the Revocation of Ways.
1320	April smiles at the question, and writes, Our old friend Mother Superior would have much to say about this.