Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. ~ Clarke's Third Law
The sphere is clear, featherlight, and perfectly smooth. It feels fine and delicate like the thinnest of glass under his fingertips, but when Henry-accidentally-drops it on the stone floor and Kate-not so accidentally-hurls it at the far wall, it doesn't even chip. There are no markings, no grooves, no clues. He speaks to it in every language he knows, then grabs a stack of books from the library and tries a few he doesn't, but it just sits there. Taunting him.
Nikola would have given up on it hours ago, except there's that whole floating thing that it does when you throw it lightly into the air. And that? That's just fascinating. Because there's absolutely nothing to explain how it's doing it, and Nikola isn't used to not being able to suss out the answer when he puts his considerable mind to a problem. Which means he has to figure out how it's doing that, if only to keep the world in balance. It's a huge responsibility being as intelligent as he is.
Midnight finds him still turning the sphere over and over in his hands, though he's moved from the lab up to Henry's room. It's not quite as good for pacing, but it has a half naked Henry propped up in bed and making all sorts of intriguing noises while reading a comic book, so that's a point in its favor. He's tapping the bauble with a wrench he found in Henry's sock drawer-the man clearly needs a better organizational system-when Henry pushes himself up off the bed enough to snag it out of his hands and tosses it up with a deft flick of his wrist . Nikola arches an eyebrow at him, but doesn't protest when Henry pulls him down onto the bed.
"It can wait until morning. I have to be up early tomorrow to go over some stuff for Magnus, so you need to stop with the pacing and muttering to yourself if you want to stay in here."
"You're telling the world's brightest mind to stop thinking just because you're feeling a little sleepy," Nikola asks with an exaggerated roll of his eyes, but he only pulls away long enough to toe off his shoes and toss his waistcoat on top of Henry's dresser. Henry shrugs and for a few moments they do the familiar shuffle of getting their bodies comfortably aligned.
"Maybe you should just accept that it's not something you can explain with science. Maybe it's something different, like magic." There's an undercurrent of excitement in Henry's voice that would be annoying coming from someone else, but is almost endearing from him.
"Don't be an idiot. Magic's not real," Nikola says, and if his tone's more affectionate than cutting, then it's only because he's only slept about five of the last seventy-five hours.
"Says the former vampire to the werewolf."
Nikola pinches Henry and points out, "Yes, but there are very clear biological and genetic explanations for us. Our kinds were only considered supernatural because humans couldn't wrap their puny minds around the real reasons."
"Whatever, Dracula," Henry says, and Tesla can feel him smirking against his neck. Nikola pokes him in the side, but Henry just huffs with amusement and reaches across his body to flip off the bedside lamp. The instant the bulb goes out, the sphere emits a low hum and the room is filled with a flurry of dancing lights, like a million tiny, silver fireflies. "Oh," Henry says softly. "Wow."
Nikola's inclined to agree-he usually reserves the word 'stunning' for a particularly complex piece of technology or Henry when he's stretched out and sobbing for release underneath him, but there's no other word that fits the light show-and he nods slowly. He wants to jump out of bed and investigate this new development, but there's something soothing about the patterns the lights are tracing through the air, which is only made better by the warm, comfortable weight of Henry's arm around his waist and head on his shoulder. So instead, he settles down a little more and just watches.
"See, it is magic," Henry says after several minutes, lifting his head enough to nudge at the underside of Nikola's jaw with his nose. "Nothing short of magic could possibly get you to shut up for this long."
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